Adorable Violence
by Cloud Zen
Summary: Hermione loves her books. Hermione loves her Harry. Get between Hermione and either at your own peril. Series of connected one-shots.
1. Chapter 1

_**This came out of a random musing of how Hermione loves books and studying. I wondered how far she might take that love of learning if something got in her way. After seeing her nearly torture herself manipulating time just to take all of the electives, I ran with the idea that she likely had no limits on how far she would go.**_

 _ **This is obviously AU and will be a series of connected oneshots in the same setting.**_

* * *

Harry was making his way towards the Great Hall for breakfast when he overheard a group of second year Hufflepuffs.

"I heard he'll be in the hospital wing for two weeks!"

Having not heard anything yet through the rumour mill, Harry slowed his pace to let him hear more of the conversation.

"Yeah, supposedly a prefect found him sometime last night after he missed curfew."

"I heard the prefect threw up after seeing his arms bent in twelve places!"

Harry stopped his attempts to appear inconspicuous. He approached the group, his curiosity getting the better of him. "Who are you talking about?"

One of the girls in the group blushed furiously, emitted a sound that Harry swore resembled the first time he saw Ginny at the Burrow. The rest of the group hushed up, looking at each other awkwardly.

Harry smiled at them. "I promise I won't bite. I just overheard you and was curious who you were talking about since I hadn't heard anything about a student being under Poppy's care."

A brown haired boy mustered his courage. "We overheard that Draco Malfoy was going to be in the hospital wing for the next two weeks."

The blushing girl continued the explanation. "Supposedly, one of the Slytherin prefects found him outside their entrance, banging his head against it since he was silenced and couldn't speak the password. Apparently, his arms were broken so badly he couldn't knock and the students inside ignored him, probably because they couldn't hear him."

Harry just stared at the group as they shuffled awkwardly. After several long moments of owlishly blinking, Harry muttered a small, "Thank you, gotta go," before rushing toward the Great Hall.

As he entered, his eyes immediately zeroed in on Hermione. Hurrying over, Harry sat down next to his friend. She continued to eat her breakfast as he attempted to stare her down.

Finally, he broke the silence.

"Is there anything you want to tell me, Hermione?"

Acting as if he were asking about the weather, she replied, "Nothing that I can think of."

Harry leaned in so as to not be overheard. "What's this I hear about Malfoy being in the Hospital Wing for two weeks?"

Hermione swallowed her mouthful of porridge. "Two weeks? Hmm, I was aiming for three."

Harry flicked her forehead.

"Ow!" Hermione rubbed the red spot his actions had left. "What was that for?"

"What did Malfoy do this time?" Harry asked, his voice brooking no nonsense.

A suddenly bashful Hermione looked down and began twiddling her fingers nervously. "He was late returning that book I needed for my potions essay."

Harry sighed. "Hermione, that essay isn't due for another month. You've already finished and revised it five times. What made you think you needed another source for it?"

Her bashful disposition continued. "I was worried I hadn't adequately explained the interaction between the stewed, minced slugs with the pickled, diced toad eye. And Malfoy was 20 minutes late turning in the only book that addresses that particular combination."

Rubbing his face in his hands, Harry let loose a long suffering sigh.

"I thought we talked about this, Hermione. You were supposed to wait until a book was a full day late before going after someone."

Hermione turned a baleful glare on Harry. "I was perfectly justified in my actions. He was late returning the book. How late doesn't matter."

Harry slumped. "Damn it all, Hermione-"

"Language!"

Harry continued as if she had not interrupted. "I know you're following the letter of the agreement but you're ignoring the spirit of it."

A proud smirk graced her face. "You can't fault me for following the letter. If you meant something else, the language should have reflected that."

Shaking his head, Harry reached out and took her hand in his. "You know better than that. Now, you're going to make me enforce the _Unjustified Clause_."

Hermione paled.

"What? No! You can't!"

Harry sadly nodded. "If you had waited a full day, I could excuse it. Twenty minutes? That's just too short a period for me to just waive off."

Hermione took her turn slumping. "Please?" she begged.

"I can't just let this go." Harry straightened up, a look of grim determination on his face. "As per our effective agreement, you have exceeded your limit for the week. You're now restricted from anything other than brief, chaste kisses at the beginning and ending of every day, holding hands, and brief hugs in accordance with Section 7, Subsection A covering the punishment for exceeding your limit of acts of retribution in a given week."

Tears began to form in the corner of Hermione's eyes. "Isn't there anything I can do?"

Harry rose, no longer hungry for breakfast. "Remember, Hermione, this is as much a punishment for me as it is for you. I don't like it but if I don't enforce it, you'd go overboard."

Walking out of the Great Hall, Harry heard the whispers of the other students. He hated to leave Hermione when she was crying but he knew if he stayed he would give in. If he never enforced the punishment clauses of their agreement, Hermione would have killed Malfoy years ago. _That would only end in the Purebloods coming after her._

"Why does he have to keep returning books late? It's almost like he likes having Hermione nearly rip him a new one, literally." Harry muttered to himself.

* * *

 _ **There will be more to this, exploring different parts of Harry and Hermione's agreement and different situations where it comes into play.**_

 _ **A version of the agreement has been drafted but is subject to change until the final chapter which will cover its drafting. It will not be posted standalone in accordance with FFN Guidelines.**_

 _ **If you enjoyed this or have ideas for situations where such an agreement might come into play, please leave a review or send a PM.**_


	2. Chapter 2

_**If this chapter doesn't put it plainly enough, there will be no particular order to this series. While chapter one could have fit almost anywhere but best third year or later, this is explicitly second year.**_

* * *

 **November 1992**

Harry was in pain. A lot of pain.

Skele-Gro was an amazing creation, capable of repairing broken bones in minutes or hours as opposed to weeks or months. It was even capable of regrowing completely missing bones, precisely why Harry was currently in the hospital wing thanks to two incompetent attempts to save his life.

If only it didn't make any muggle or magical effort to suppress pain potentially lethal. The best one could hope for was for the pain to knock them unconscious.

Harry groused. "Stupid arm. Stupid bludger. Stupid Quidditch. Stupid Dobby. Stupid Lockhart. Stupid Hogwarts."

Stopping his audible grumbling, Harry tried to focus on something other than the pain in his arm. When that didn't work, he tried to avoid thinking of anything related to the chain of events leading up to him needing to endure said pain.

Nothing worked.

"Stupid everything."

While he had overheard Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall, and Madam Pomfrey talking about the Chamber of Secrets when they brought a petrified Colin Creevey in, their absence left him with nothing to distract him from the pain in his arm.

Harry had no idea if he had been lying awake for five minutes or five hours when his solitude was blissfully disturbed by Dumbledore again.

To Harry's dismay, the headmaster was followed promptly by Snape.

"Every one of my second years!" Snape seethed.

Harry was much more interested now.

"I am aware, Severus, of the plight of your second years. While finding who is responsible is important, seeing to their care must take precedence." Dumbledore tried to placate Snape.

At that moment, Madam Pomfrey returned to the infirmary. "What in the world happened, Headmaster?"

"Alas, while we are not entirely sure of the events that lead to our current situation, the result is that every Slytherin second year is in need of your care. Minerva, Filius, and Pomona are bringing them now."

Harry fought every urge to lean in to hear better for fear of being heard.

Madam Pomfrey gasped. "Every second year? What in the world happened?"

Snape was so angry he nearly hissed out, "Draco has had every bone in both arms vanished. Nott's legs are broken so it's like he has three knees all bending different directions. Zabini looks like he fell down a dozen flights of stairs. Crabbe's arms and legs have been switched with Goyle's and put on backwards. Parkinson's face looks like one giant pimple. Davis looks like she had every hair on her body plucked, one at a time. Roper's nose is the size of a broomstick. And Greengrass's ears are the size of a dragon's wings.

"Everything was done with esoteric spells that I've been unable to reverse."

Harry blinked in shock. Whoever had gotten ahold of Malfoy and his sycophants, had decided to be creative. Turning his attention back to the adults, Harry realized he had missed something Snape said.

"Now, Severus, I understand you believe it could have only been the Gryffindors after the events which transpired during and after today's Quidditch match. However, except for young Harry, every Gryffindor was accounted for in their tower during the time the incidents must have occurred."

Laying back with a smile on his face, Harry let himself drift off listening to the dulcet tones of Snape being absolutely furious and unable to find a way to take it out on his favourite target.

When Harry awoke the next morning, Hermione was sitting quietly in a chair beside his bed.

Taking in the moment, Harry watched his friend read a charms book he had never seen before. After several minutes, he cleared his throat.

Hermione jumped at the sound, looking for the culprit that disturbed her reading. Upon seeing Harry looking at her, a little worse for the wear after his painful night of regrowing thirty-three bones, Hermione launched into a torrent of questions.

"Harry!" she cried out. "How are you feeling? Is your arm healed? I've read that Skele-Gro is particularly painful when you have to regrow multiple bones as opposed to just healing breaks. Is it true that Madam Pomfrey couldn't give you anything for the pain? Do you need me to take notes for you in class? What about your books, do you need me to get them-"

"Hermione!" Harry interjected, causing her to stop her seemingly endless stream of questions."I'm fine. Other than being a little short of sleep, I'm fine. Madam Pomfrey should be in soon to tell me how long I have to be careful. I can't answer anything else until then."

She flushed at being called out. She tried to curtail her habit of spewing questions without waiting for answers. When it came to Harry, it was particularly hard to control herself.

"Anyway," he continued, "have you heard anything about what happened last night?"

When Hermione flushed, Harry narrowed his eyes in suspicion.

"I was awake when they brought Colin in, saying the monster in the Chamber of Secrets attacked him."

Hermione nodded. "Professor Dumbledore told everyone at breakfast this morning. Everyone is really starting to get worried."

Harry waited for her to continue. When she didn't, he asked, "What about Malfoy and the other Slytherins that they brought in last night?"

All of a sudden, Hermione found her lap very interesting. After a bit of hesitation, she answered. "Professor Dumbledore mentioned something about that, too."

"And why do you look like you want the universe to swallow you up instead of talking about it?"

"Because they were laughing about you being in the hospital wing overnight and it got me so mad!" Hermione blurted out. "If they thought it was funny then I thought they deserved to have a laugh at themselves!"

Harry sighed. Reaching out he pulled a petulant Hermione to him. Harry took a moment to collect his thoughts, using the opportunity to lay a kiss on the top of her head. "You've got to stop doing this. Eventually someone is going to piece together that you're the one that keeps putting everyone in the hospital wing. Sure, Malfoy is a git and Snape's sneering could power a small country, but you can't do this every single time. Just because someone checked out a book you want or said something nasty about me doesn't give you the right to test the limits of Madam Pomfrey's skill. Replacing Snape's hands with cloven hooves was funny, but it took her a week to fix it and we could have class again.

"We have got to find a way to get you to cut back. I'm not sure we could get you to stop, so maybe cutting back is enough for now."

Harry let loose another sigh. "I still don't know whether or not to praise your creativity."

Had Harry been paying attention, he might have realized his miniature lecture was being completely ignored in favor of Hermione trying to happily burrow deeper into his side. Apparently, Harry kisses to her crown were especially nice.

* * *

 _ **Just another little excuse to let our adorably violent Hermione loose on the second most irredeemable character in canon, Draco Malfoy. Snape will get his comeuppance later.**_

 _ **If you enjoyed this or have ideas for situations where the implied agreement might come into play, please leave a review or send a PM.**_


	3. Chapter 3

_**Hermione has to make sure other girls stay away from Harry. Obviously.**_

* * *

 **December 1994**

Hermione stormed through the corridors of the seventh floor. She had just left the Tower after overhearing two girls talking about how they heard two skanky bitches from Hufflepuff were going to corner Harry and ask him to the Yule Ball. The situation was completely unacceptable.

No skanky bitch was going to the Yule Ball with Harry if Hermione had anything to say about it.

She was on a mission. Her destination was the school kitchens whose entrance just happened to be next to the entrance to the Hufflepuff dormitory. Taking the stairs two or three at a time, she ran to her goal.

Slightly out of breath from her rush, Hermione took several deep, forceful breaths. It was as good an excuse as any to cover up the effects of the raging inferno within her.

Hermione slipped in behind a suit of armour, allowing her an excellent view of the corridor outside the Hufflepuff entrance while concealing her from any casual passersby.

One minute passed as she slowed her breathing. Then five minutes passed. Twenty minutes.

An hour passed with Hermione waiting just out of sight.

Finally, the portrait opened to reveal Susan Bones and Hannah Abbott.

It took everything Hermione had to rein in the growl that threatened to escape her throat.

As soon as the portrait closed, Hermione readied her wand. Five more steps and they would be in a blind spot from all the portraits.

She started the complicated wand movement pattern for her jinx.

Three steps.

She murmured the incantation.

One step.

The spell zipped across the corridor, just outside the corners of their fields of vision.

A perfect hit.

Hermione let out a slow, silent breath, secure in her retribution against those who threatened to take Harry away from her.

 _Harry_.

Hermione was in a panic.

 _I've already used up my skanky bitch quota for the week! What am I going to do?_

Her targets were walking just fast enough they were already in view of the portraits again. They were headed straight for the Great Hall where everyone would see them. There was no time to revert the spell.

She tried to convince herself everything would be okay, that she wouldn't miss out on any cuddling or kissy face time with Harry.

 _It's just a harmless prank. The twins could have done it. After the way Hufflepuff treated Harry, they would deserve it. Any Gryffindor would agree. Oo! Any Gryffindor could have done it, not just the twins!_

Hermione was so lost in her thoughts she nearly missed the shriek as the delayed effect spell triggered just outside the Great Hall.

Susan and Hannah had just walked into the great hall, completely naked, fluorescent pink from head to toe with large, lime green polka dots covering them absolutely everywhere.

With the chaos that would ensue, Hermione had to stay hidden behind the armour or everyone would know it was her.

Lunch eventually passed. The bedlam had calmed. Two teary-eyed Hufflepuffs had been comforted but were now too embarrassed to approach Harry.

 _Mission Accomplished._

As Hermione took her first step out from her hiding spot, she heard someone clear their throat in a very pointed manner. Hermione cringed, knowing exactly who was behind her. Slowly, she turned to face her discoverer.

"Is there some reason you're hiding in the shadows acting like you're up to no good?"

His green eyes bored into her. His expression screamed he was very much not pleased. He was even tapping his foot impatiently. _This is not good._

Hermione sheepishly grinned. "There isn't any way to convince you I had nothing to do with what happened at lunch is there?"

He simply shook his head, slowly and deliberately, never breaking eye contact. Hermione slumped.

Harry sighed. "I don't even want to know what they did. I can't in any way believe it justified being humiliated in front of the entire school."

She tried to interrupt, to swear it was justified, but the words just wouldn't come out.

"This puts you way over your limit. That's a whole extra week I have to go without kisses and cuddles."

Harry reached out and pulled her into a gentle hug. Hermione clung to him as if her life depended on it.

"I'm not even mad. I can't stay mad at you and you know that. I just hate it when you do this and make us give up so much."

Hermione soaked up as much of the hug as she could, knowing they would be few, short, and far between for the next two weeks. It would be torturous. It would be agonizing.

Everything would have been so much easier if Harry would just let her deal with things once and for all and hide the bodies.

* * *

 _ **Several readers have contributed a slew of ideas that I'm practically in a state of maniacal laughter wanting to explore. Now I just have to get them on paper.**_

 _ **If you enjoyed this or have ideas for situations where the implied agreement might come into play, please leave a review or send a PM.**_


	4. Chapter 4

_**I have been informed this has the "Pax Seal of Approval" by Pax Humana, who has acted as beta for all four entries in this series so far. Hope the rest of you enjoy it as well.**_

* * *

 **December 1993**

Minerva McGonagall waited for the last of her third year Lions to join them in the Great Hall for breakfast. While many students had returned home for the Yule holidays, a few notable exceptions stayed behind, including Potter, Granger, and Weasley. The youngest male Weasley was yet to show, extremely peculiar given his love of food and his undying determination to be one of Mr Potter's closest friends.

Mr Potter and Miss Granger had long since arrived and were close to finishing their respective meals without even a glance about looking for their friend. When the house elves began to clean the empty platters away, Minerva decided enough was enough. Making her way down to the Head Boy, she began her inquiry.

"Mr Weasley, do you know where your youngest brother has gotten off to?"

Percy Weasley met her gaze. "No, ma'am. I haven't seen him all morning."

Minerva raised an eyebrow. "And don't you find that odd given his usual habits regarding meals?"

The oldest Weasley student began nervously looking about, likely trying to locate his wayward sibling.

The Deputy Headmistress continued. "I have not heard anything from Madam Pomfrey, so he is not in the hospital wing. Therefore, Mr Weasley, you will accompany me back to the tower to locate him as you seem unable to keep track of your charges without supervision."

Knowing she had embarrassed her Head Boy and likely generated some animosity between the brothers, MInerva did not wait for an acknowledgement. She made her way down the table, stopping briefly once she reached Mr Potter and Miss Granger.

Without pause, she asked about their missing friend. "Do you two happen to know where Mr Weasley has gotten off to?"

After a short, shared look, Miss Granger answered for the two of them. "We haven't seen him since bed last night when we had a bit of a row over the broom Harry received yesterday."

Having been a teacher for many decades, Minerva knew when students were lying. Having survived the Marauders, for her sanity she let many little lies go. Such was the case with Miss Granger's answer.

Nodding her assent, Minerva gestured for Percy to follow her as she made her way back to Gryffindor Tower.

As the pair approached the tower portrait, she began to hear muffled sounds. Arriving at the entrance to the tower, guarded by the allegedly affectionately nicknamed Fat Lady, Minerva once again inquisitively quirked an eyebrow.

"Charlotte, what is that ruckus I'm hearing?"

The portrait looked awash in relief that the Head of House was there. "I'm not sure, ma'am. I've just been hearing this awful caterwauling, coming from behind me since just after breakfast started."

"Very well, we'll just have to investigate." With a nod, the portrait opened unleashing a blast of sound that threatened to put Minerva and her companion on their rears.

"SOMEBODY GET ME DOWN FROM HERE!"

Charging forward with the requisite courage of a member of her house; Minerva bound into the common room looking around for the trouble.

When she looked up, she immediately turned her eyes away.

"Mr Weasley! What in the name of-" she cut herself off before her words got away from her. "What are you doing riding a broom without a stitch of clothing in the middle of the house common room?"

Ron Weasley, even after two and a half years of near punishment for being unable to put a stopper in his mouth, had yet to learn his lesson. "Some bloody Snake stuck me up here in the middle of the night! He stuck my hands to the broom and made it so the broom wouldn't move! Get me the bloody hell down from here!"

Minerva's lips thinned. Turning to the Head Boy at her side, she issued her commands. "Mr Weasley. Seeing as, according to your brother, there has been someone trespassing in the tower, I must investigate the matter. I leave it to you to get him down, clothed, and appropriately punished for his language and behaviour in the presence of a faculty member." With a firm glare she issued one final caveat. "Do not take out your frustrations for failing your responsibilities on him."

With a swish of her robes, Minerva turned and left to inform the Headmaster of another break-in. Rather, that was the impression she wanted to leave with the brothers Weasley. Her destination was with someone far more likely to have knowledge of the events.

Arriving at the school library, she walked over to the desk where Irma Pince was scowling at the students using the resources with careless disregard to their value. "Irma, do you happen to know where Miss Granger is hidden away?"

The librarian's scowl lessened at the mention of the only student who had proven to adequately care for what she viewed as her children. "Miss Granger is with Mr Potter at their usual table in the back, behind the charms section."

A polite nod signaling her understanding, Minerva departed with her destination established. As she neared the back wall, Minerva walked down the second-to-last row, providing a wall between her and the target table.

Nearing the table, she stopped a few feet short so as to not be directly visible through the gaps in the bookcases.

"Hermione, what did you do to Ron?"

At Mr Potter's statement, Minerva cast a quick charm to magnify the volume of the conversation slightly.

"Nothing he didn't deserve."

Mr Potter let loose a sigh. "And what did he deserve for trying to get me angry with you for reporting the broomstick to McGonagall?"

"He wanted a broomstick. I gave him a broomstick. One that he will never be able to separate himself from."

 _Thud._

Minerva knew that sound. Fifteen years and she still recognized the sound of a Potter banging his head against a table due to a headache from his paramour.

Mr Potter's muffled voice filtered through the bookshelves. "Fine, considering what he said last night it was justified. Just, no more for the rest of the week. Okay, Hermione?"

Minerva heard some shuffling. Peering through the shelves, she saw her two favourite students cuddling, not that she would ever admit to having favourites.

Miss Granger was curled up, completely in Mr Potter's lap. It was an adorably nostalgic sight. Mr Potter's father and mother had cuddled the exact same way after that traitor Sirius Black had been irritated at being ignored and turned both of their hair Slytherin green.

History repeated itself in the most delightful of ways, Minerva decided.

Now, she just had to report to Albus that it was merely a prank and there was no evidence as to who was responsible.

* * *

 _ **Yes. This is only the start of Ron's misery. I won't say I hate the character, but he leaves a lot to be desired in my opinion.**_

 _ **If you enjoyed this or have ideas for situations where we might find our adorably violent Hermione getting revenge for some slight against her or her Harry, please leave a review or send a PM.**_


	5. Chapter 5

_**This idea was first proposed to me by Pax Humana. I can never say enough to thank him for his tireless efforts acting as a Beta Reader and general sounding board.**_

* * *

 **October 1994**

Fleur Delacour was many things, elegant, graceful, intelligent, and, if you asked any male, absolutely bloody gorgeous. She did admit to herself that she sometimes came across as aloof or stuck up, but that was mostly a defense mechanism she developed in response to the unwanted attention her Veela heritage caused.

Coming to Hogwarts was a mixed blessing for her. She knew there would be dozens of idiot males wanting to be gifted her favor and dozens more wanting to find a way under her robes.

There would also be many girls that had no preconceptions about her. She had never inadvertently caused problems between them and their boyfriends. They didn't have six years of looking absolutely perfect without even trying rubbed in their faces. They were potentially a fresh start, a new chance at making friends.

Hogwarts was a beautiful castle. The flickering candlelight that filled the corridors added a charm and romanticism that the more sterile halls of Beauxbatons desperately lacked. The girls were pleasant enough, though Fleur did not expect to make fast friends because of the obviously competitive nature of the Ravenclaw girls.

Looking around, she saw the two nearest containers of bouillabaisse were empty. She internalized a sigh. The house elves had prepared a very grand feast, but the soup was the only thing that stood out as properly reminding her of home.

Continuing to look around, she noticed there was a half full bowl immediately behind her on the table of the scarlet and gold house. Rising, she took a few quick steps to see if they might share.

"Excuse me, are you wanting ze bouillabaisse?"

There was a redheaded boy whose face turned purple, trying to answer but the only sound that came from him was a faint gurgling noise. There was a brunette girl with a seemingly deliberately understated beauty, almost as if she was trying to keep men from looking at her. Finally, there was a young man - the way he carried himself showed he was no boy - with roguishly messy black hair and brilliant emerald eyes Fleur was starting to lose herself in.

It was the third individual who gently pushed the bowl towards her. "Sure, I think we're done with it."

As Fleur graciously accepted the dish, she returned to the Ravenclaw table. Behind her, she heard the brunette girl and the black haired young man tease the redhead for his reaction.

Just as she was about to sit, Fleur stopped. The black haired young man had remained coherent, polite, and pleasant the entirety of the ten second conversation. His only hesitation was when he looked up to identify who was speaking.

Thoughts of his shining emerald eyes filled her mind the remainder of the meal. Fleur barely paid any mind to the announcements regarding the dignitaries and the Goblet of Fire. She already knew she was going to enter herself as a candidate, so the mysticism was lost on her.

Fleur flinched when she realized her papa would chastise her for letting her attention wander the way it had. He would often tell her, "Who you know is just as important as what you know." Ignoring information about who the important people were was almost as large a _faux pas_ as she could make in his eyes.

After all of the pomp and circumstance, the entirety of the eligible Beauxbatons contingent wrote their names and school on scraps of parchment and tossed them into the goblet.

With their obligations for the evening met, the group returned to their carriage. Fleur promptly prepared herself for bed, finding and donning a thicker nightdress than normal to fight off the Scottish chill that permeated the magical carriage.

Fleur drifted off, thinking of those wonderful emerald eyes.

Slowing coming to, Fleur quickly realized she was not in her bed any longer.

Tied to a heavy chair, bound in a dark room, Fleur fought every instinct to panic. Losing herself would not help.

"I see you've joined me, Miss Delacour. Fleur Isabelle Delacour. That is your name, is it not?"

Fighting off that urge to panic was getting a lot more difficult for Fleur.

"Fleur Isabelle Delacour, born the 14th of May in 1977 to Sebastian and Apolline, one younger sister, Gabrielle, currently 8. Descended from a Veela line, the last publicly confirmed full blooded Veela being the maternal grandmother. Little known fact, there is no such thing as a partial Veela. Female, born to a Veela, therefore a Veela.

"Writes at least one letter to Gabrielle a week. Has since starting at Beauxbatons. Reads to her at bedtime every Friday and Saturday night possible.

"Father is currently a senior member of the _Parlement Magique_. Currently favored to be the next _Premier Ministre de Magie_.

"Mother is currently liaison between Magical France and the Veela enclaves.

"Family has three residences. One large apartment in Paris, your primary residence due to your father's career, located in the _14th arrondissement_ near the _Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris_. One in Marseille in the Vieux Port south of the _Canebière_ , an oceanfront residence on the _Rue des Catalans_ miraculously spared by Allied bombing. The last is just outside Bordeaux, is where the family vineyard is located and typically used as a summer home. Sebastian keeps a small stable of horses there for his daughters to ride when the fancy strikes them.

"No notable injuries. Up to date on all immunizations. Served as chaser on a summer league team. Set the league record for goals, assists, and steals in a game and season. Offered and rejected five lucrative modeling contracts this last summer alone.

"Currently top of her class at Beauxbatons. Two close friends, Michelle and Sylvie. No boyfriend, current or past, never made it past a second date with any one. Has a thing for boys with a bit of a wild side.

"Spent all of last night dreaming about one male, black haired, green eyed Gryffindor. Missed all major announcements surrounding dignitaries and the tournament. Had to sort through five nightdresses to find one heavy enough for the Scottish latitudes."

Silence filled the room except for the occasional dripping of water on the stone floor. Fleur held her breath, wondering what her insane captor would say or do next.

The silence was finally broken.

"I know where you sleep. I know where you live. I've proven I can get to you. I've proven I know everything about you and your family."

The voice took on a dark and ominous twist. "Stay away from the man with the green eyes."

Fleur saw a flash of brown hair before darkness overtook her.

Fleur shot up, breathing hard and fast. Looking around, she was back in her bed. The only indication anything was amiss were the mild rope marks on her wrist.

Thinking back over the day before and her subsequent nighttime encounter, Fleur replayed everything step by step.

Remembering the final words of her captor, Fleur knew what she had to do.

She had to get the man with the green eyes.

* * *

 _ **Fleur is still Fleur, no matter what. Sometimes the Adorably Violent Hermione's efforts backfire. This is just a springboard into other things that may include her.**_

 _ **If you enjoyed this or have ideas for situations where we might find our adorably violent Hermione getting revenge for some slight against her or her Harry, please leave a review or send a PM.**_


	6. Chapter 6

_**A few readers, namely EndlessChains and TIGGRAIN, pointed out that I had failed to appropriately unleash Adorable Violence on Lockhart for his part in Harry's first Skele-Gro experience.**_

 _ **In hindsight, I have decided to view it as such: Lockhart actually caused the need for the Skele-Gro and the associated pain, meaning his punishment will be that much worse. This is much shorter than normal, but that's just how this one turned out.**_

 _ **Thanks to EndlessChains and TIGGRAIN for the idea.**_

* * *

 **November 1992**

Hermione was sitting in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, waiting with the rest of the Gryffindors for the arrival of Professor Gilderoy Lockhart. She idly thumbed through her charms textbook, having long since finished reading every book required for Defense three times.

Getting through that third time was especially painful.

Looking around, her eyes fell on Harry. A happy sigh slipped from her lips at the sight of his wonderfully messy black hair and dreamy green eyes. He was joking with Neville about something causing a smile that made her weak in the knees to spread over his face.

 _My Harry is simply wonderful._

Checking her watch, Hermione noted Professor Lockhart was running over twenty minutes late. It was utterly unlike him. With a shrug of her shoulders, Hermione pulled out another book on charms.

Her eyes drifted back to Harry at the sound of his laughter. It took everything she had to not let loose a dreamy sigh.

She dragged her eyes back to her book. She had read it before but she thought it couldn't hurt to read about triggering delayed effects a third time.

Ten minutes later, the class was beyond restless. Finally, after immense prodding from his peers, Harry went up to the professor's office door off the room.

Knocking gently, the class waited with rapt attention.

"Professor Lockhart? Are you ready for class to begin?"

The entire class heard shuffling come through the wall.

Harry knocked again. "Professor Lockhart?"

A muffled voice filled the classroom. "Harry! Yes, so sorry. I'm afraid class is canceled for today. Run along now."

Harry frowned. "Professor Lockhart, is everything okay?" Harry reached to open the door.

"Everything is fine," a hurried voice answered. "Don't worry about it. I'm just caught up taking care of a few things." The professor's voice was still muffled.

Harry opened the door and peered inside.

Harry shut the door.

Facing the classroom Harry spoke. "You lot heard him. No class today."

Amidst the grumbling at how long the class had to wait to find out, Harry made his way over to where Hermione was packing up her things.

Clearing his throat to get her attention, Harry waited for Hermione to look up at him.

When she finally did, she nearly flinched at his hard face.

"Would you care to explain why our Defense Against the Dark Arts professor is currently bald and looks like he had his face smashed in?"

Hermione shook her head.

"And how about seeing teeth all over his office floor?"

She shook her head again.

"I only saw maybe ten. Do I want to know where the rest of his teeth went?"

"I think he swallowed them."

Realizing she actually answered, Hermione clamped her hands over her mouth.

Harry sighed.

"Will his hair and teeth grow back?"

Slowly, Hermione lowered her hands. Meekly, she answered. "They should. It might take a few weeks even with potions, draughts, and salves but they should. The bruising on his face might take a bit longer."

Without another word, Harry moved to collect his supplies. Hermione followed after.

As he was gathering his things, with her enthusiastic help, he asked, "Why didn't you tell me about all this earlier? We wouldn't have been stuck here waiting on him for the last hour."

Not hesitating in the slightest, Hermione answered. "I haven't really had a chance to."

Harry stopped. "Hermione, you spent all day hovering over me making sure I didn't do anything to hurt my arm. We were alone plenty of times. If you did it last night, you could have told me while we were walking here from breakfast. You had opportunities, so why didn't you tell me?"

Hermione simply hummed to herself.

Harry shook his head, grumbling slightly. "We're going to have to talk about this later."

Hermione continued humming, putting his last quill away in just the right spot.

Harry picked up his bag that Hermione had graciously finished packing for him. Just before they left the classroom, Harry gave her one last look. "What was it this time?"

Hermione wrapped herself around Harry's right arm, with its freshly regrown thirty-three bones, a beaming smile on her face. "Let's go to the library, okay?"

Harry had not stopped shaking his head for some reason.

* * *

 _ **Like I said, much shorter than normal but this one fought me every step of the way. Again, thanks to EndlessChains and TIGGRAIN for the idea.**_

 _ **If you enjoyed this or have ideas for situations where we might find our adorably violent Hermione getting revenge for some slight against her or her Harry, please leave a review or send a PM.**_


	7. Chapter 7

_**I didn't have much time today - family obligations take precedence over anything else - but I did manage to squeeze this in. This has now been beta read which has not added any appreciable length or changes.**_

* * *

 **January 1995**

Amidst all the insanity that comprised the Triwizard Tournament on top of the usual craziness that was Hogwarts, moments of peace and quiet were extremely hard to come by. Harry had gone to rather extreme lengths, including bribing the Weasley twins, to buy a few hours of distraction where he could treat Hermione to something romantic.

Thanks to the presence of the other schools, dignitaries, press, and Tournament obligations, finding both a time and a place was especially difficult, hence Harry's recruitment of the twins. Currently, they were surreptitiously testing a new, defective, line of fireworks for their upcoming store. That defect changed the testing from surreptitious to the equivalent of an air raid siren. From what Harry could tell, the resulting chaos would have everyone from the headmaster on down busy cleaning up for the next few hours.

Taking advantage of the focus being on someone, something, anything else, Harry had grabbed Hermione by the hand and dragged her out to the Great Lake. Having found a relatively secluded spot, Harry had laid a blanket out. From the picnic basket prepared by Dobby, who was fearfully compliant once he learned Hermione would be sharing it, Harry pulled a wide assortment of warm, tasty goodies to ward off the chill of the winter air.

"This is nice." Hermione was snuggling into his side.

They had just finished feeding one another finger sandwiches, an act that caused Harry to blush when it was just the two of them. Regardless, it was something he would gladly do for Hermione even in the middle of the Great Hall if she wanted. He would deny until the day he died that he liked it, too.

"I'll have to thank the twins. They provided the distraction so we could get away and enjoy all this."

Hermione turned up to him. "Shh. I don't want to think about anyone but us." After laying a quick kiss on his cheek, she burrowed further into him.

The two stayed like that for the better part of an hour. Aside from a few brief conversations, the occasional kiss, and lots of cuddling, Harry and Hermione sat in the cool winter weather, surrounded by fresh snowfall, and just held each other as close as their bodies allowed.

Eventually, a light beeping sounded. Harry looked at his offending watch. Letting loose a groan, Harry regretfully pried Hermione from him.

"It's time to head in. The twins couldn't promise any more than what we've had."

Pouting, Hermione rose, straightened her skirt, and with a quick wave of her wand, packed everything up.

Harry just watched her. "It's amazing how gifted you are. You didn't even say any incantation."

Hermione blushed at the praise. "It's not that big of a thing."

The two walked arm in arm, headed back toward the castle bathed in the waning evening light.

As the pair rounded the first rise, Harry felt a tingling sensation. While odd, Harry opted to dismiss it.

Rounding the second rise, the one that would bring the castle entrance in sight, Harry noticed a pile of powder blue. Just as he was about to lead Hermione over, she tugged on his arm.

"It's nothing to worry about, Harry. It was just one of the Beauxbatons girls spying on us. Probably wanted to sell Skeeter more information."

Hesitantly, Harry stopped pulling against Hermione's arm and let her guide him back to the castle.

Harry knew something important had just happened. Likely, Hermione had just done something that might cause him to have to enact punishment clauses from their agreement. After having spent the last few hours happily fulfilling one of his obligations under Section 3 of their agreement, which, frankly, he was sure he would never view as an obligation, Harry was loath to think about something less joyful.

Hermione would tell him what she had just done eventually. The consequences for trying to hide such things were things that neither of them wanted to contemplate.

With a deep breath, Harry focused back on the witch on his arm and the castle doors in front of them.

Had he looked back, he would have seen a frazzled Fleur Delacour, with hair all a-frizz like she had been struck by lightning, climbing to her feet and scowling at Hermione's back.

"A static ward, strong enough to knock me out until you left ze boundary." Fleur patted down a smoldering ember on her robes. "Well played, 'Ermione Granger. 'Owever, I will still 'ave 'im."

* * *

 _ **Once again, if you enjoyed this or have ideas for situations where we might find our adorably violent Hermione getting revenge for some slight against her or her Harry, please leave a review or send a PM.**_


	8. Chapter 8

**This has now been beta read by Pax Humana. He caught several things that I overlooked in my haste to get this up. He also made several suggestions that made the piece flow better.**

 **This is what happens when you interrupt Hermione's study time for any appreciable duration. Credit for the idea as to what Hermione needed retribution for belongs to my beta, Pax Humana. I added the mechanism of revenge.**

* * *

 **June 1993**

Hermione tapped her foot impatiently.

It had ended up being an extreme rush job but she got her revenge. This time, it was particularly well deserved.

Had Harry known about her efforts, he would have happily helped her but she hadn't had time to coordinate with him. It had taken four days to finally get the message through that thick house elf's head. Four days of increasing intensity.

The first day, Hermione had simply warned Dobby never to do anything that chanced injury to her Harry ever again. Dobby's deranged, unused ideas regarding how to go about saving Harry's life would have made an insane individual question Dobby's sanity. When Dobby refused to fall in line, Hermione had escalated.

The second day, Hermione had threatened to cut off any access to Harry. That had made the house elf angry and the stupid little creature had promised retribution on anyone that tried to do so. Hermione could respect his mentality except for one thing: Harry was _her_ Harry, not anyone else's.

The third day, Dobby awoke, chained to a wall, unable to use any of his elf-y magic to escape. Hermione had then spent the better part of four hours convincing him that not only had she proved she could find him and get at him without anyone being the wiser, she was not afraid to take things further. She had particularly loved emphasising how no one would ever be as important to Harry as she was already. Not quite disillusioned, Dobby had weakly protested her declarations but was close to falling in line.

The fourth day, Hermione had almost regretted having to put a reenergized Dobby back in his place. Only almost, because no one could match her devotion to Harry. By mutual agreement, neither Hermione nor Dobby would ever repeat what she had needed to do that last day.

Once Dobby had fallen in line with the rank and file of the rest of existence, Hermione returned to what had been driving her, revenge on Lucius Malfoy.

The pillock had cost her months of reading because of his stupid diary plan!

And she wasn't even his target.

When Hermione had pieced together that her petrification was simply collateral damage during Malfoy's attempt to discredit Arthur Weasley after their public row, she had felt insulted. An insulted Hermione was never a safe Hermione to be around.

Once she had Dobby's assistance, Hermione found her options to get her revenge upon the elder Malfoy were greatly expanded. Unfortunately, she still had to concede that time had been running out on her, hence the rush to get it completed.

It was the last day of the year. It was time for the year end feast in the Great Hall. Hermione had enacted her plan the night before with Dobby but had yet to hear anything.

Harry reached out and placed a hand on her knee under the table. It stilled her nerves somewhat but not entirely.

"I know it feels odd that we don't have exams, but I promise it's okay."

Hermione smiled. Harry knew her so well. Exams might not be the first thing on her mind that evening but they were third, after Harry himself and Lucius Malfoy.

Just as Dumbledore was about to stand up to make his end of year speech, the massive doors of the Great Hall flew open.

In walked a white-faced Lucius Malfoy. His face was so pale that Hermione wondered if wearing a Death Eater mask would have added a little healthy colour to his cheeks.

Silently, Lucius marched up to Draco, shared a few quiet words that caused Draco to pale almost as much as his father, then promptly left the Great Hall with Draco meekly in tow.

Hushed whispers filled the hall after their departure, the rumour mill already in overdrive.

"What did you do?" Harry asked her in a voice pitched for her ears alone.

Hermione looked over at Harry with a curious expression.

"You smiled when you saw him coming in," Harry chastised. "You need to learn how to hide things like that better."

Hermione nodded in acknowledgement before answering Harry's question.

"I simply took a page out of my father's favourite movie and had Dobby help me implement it."

Harry quirked an eyebrow, waiting for her to finished.

Hermione outright smirked. "Daddy's favourite movie is _The Godfather._ The second one actually, but he likes the whole trilogy and I borrowed the idea from the first one." At Harry's befuddled look, she continued. "I'd like to think I improved on the original, but all I did was transfigure a few things and they should have woken to a surprise in their beds this morning."

Harry was obviously still unsure what she had done. Rather than explaining things further, Hermione entwined her fingers with his.

She was certainly going to make sure they spent more time together in the coming summer break than they had the year before. Letters alone just didn't cut it. No pesky house elves or Dursleys would stop her this time!

* * *

 _ **Like the last two chapters, this sadly ended up having to be a rush job to get it out today.**_

 _ **Once again, if you enjoyed this or have ideas for situations where we might find our adorably violent Hermione getting revenge for some slight against her or her Harry, please leave a review or send a PM.**_


	9. Chapter 9

_**Here we see the first exposure of Harry to the Adorably Violent Hermione.**_

 _ **Thanks again to Pax Humana for acting as Beta Reader for this project of mine. Credit for the idea goes to reviewer Fibinaci.**_

* * *

 **November 1991**

Close to midnight, the party in the Gryffindor Tower came to a close. Everyone was incredibly excited to win the opening Quidditch match of the year. Hermione thought they might be even more excited than normal since it was Harry Potter, their beloved Boy-Who-Lived, who caught the snitch to secure the win.

The small fact that he had caught the snitch by nearly swallowing it made his legend even greater in the eyes of the house.

The fact that he had nearly been thrown from his broom minutes before this because of a curse cast by a _professor_ of all people caused Hermione to seethe in anger.

Harry was her new friend. Hermione could reluctantly admit he was actually one of her only friends. He had risked his life to save her just a week prior by jumping on the back of a twelve foot tall troll, tall, lumpy, and smelling worse than anything she could imagine.

She and Harry had spent much of the night after the incident talking in the common room. He had confessed to locking the beast in the bathroom with her, not knowing she was in there.

Knowing that he had tried to help even after doing that, inadvertent as it may have been, had caused a warm, fuzzy feeling to well up in her chest.

She had scarcely left his side since.

Part of it was that he made her feel safe. Part of it was that warm, fuzzy feeling. Part of it was his dreamy, green eyes.

Most of it was to protect him from the idiot that had caused her to be in the bathroom in the first place.

Thanks to her intervention, Harry's grades had already improved and that Weasley idiot was already well and truly marginalized. Everything was going well.

That was until the Quidditch match.

Hermione slipped out of her bed, seeds of ideas cascading into a waterfall of creative alternatives. She shook her head. "Stupid Daddy watching that stupid western."

Making her way out of the tower, Hermione stuck to the shadows, slipping past all the portraits while remaining out of sight.

Twenty agonizing minutes later, she found herself outside the Potions classroom.

 _We'll see how you like getting cursed. You should have known better than to go after my Harry._

Hermione blinked.

 _My Harry? Hmm, I like the sound of that._ A smile broke out on her face. _My Harry._

Shaking the thought from her mind, Hermione refocused on the task at hand. At that thought, she gazed down at her hands, another idea taking root in her mind.

An hour later, Hermione was finished, back in bed, and trying her hardest to resist cackling with maniacal laughter while drifting off to sleep.

The next morning, Hermione was at her usual place, by Harry's side, as she sat down in the great hall. About half of the school was present, the dull roar of hundreds of conversations filling the air.

The doors slammed open.

In walked a man with billowing black robes.

He also had greasy hair covering long ears. In place of his hands and feet were uncloven hooves. His large nose turned snout had a hook like appearance. Sticking out the back of his robes was a short tail with a tuft of greasy hair at the end.

In short, an anthropomorphized donkey.

The partially transfigured man tried to shout at the headmaster.

A braying sound echoed in the otherwise silent Great Hall.

Someone over at the Slytherin table snorted.

The ice was broken. Everywhere in the Great Hall howled with laughter. Nothing Professor Dumbledore did allowed him to regain control of the chaos.

Eventually giving up, Professor Dumbledore and Madam Pomfrey escorted the suffering individual from the Great Hall.

"Wait, was that Snape?"

Hermione wanted to roll her eyes. "Yes, Ron. Based on the robes and the oily hair, I suspect that was most likely _Professor_ Snape." She hated referring to the man by that title, but decorum had to be maintained.

Harry turned to look at her. "What do you think he did to deserve that?"

Putting on her practiced _butter-wouldn't-melt-in-her-mouth_ look, Hermione looked back at him. "I suppose he made an _ass_ of himself after the Quidditch match."

After giving her a significant look, Harry simply shook his head. "Oh well. Hey, I wonder how he got his robes on with those hooves for hands."

Ron looked at Harry with a dumbfounded expression. "That's what you care about? What's wrong with you? I'm trying to burn that sight into my memory forever. Perfect blackmail material, that's what that is!"

Hermione chimed in, "Are you sure you want to try to blackmail Professor Snape over this?"

Ron paled at the implications, his freckles standing out prominently.

It took Madam Pomfrey, Professor Dumbledore, and the entire St. Mungo's staff two weeks to reverse the changes. Hermione made sure that Harry learned more about potions in those two weeks than he had learned in two months under Professor Snape's instruction. Her reward system had made Harry a highly motivated student.

* * *

 _ **Later than usual today, but all in all, I'm quite happy with this one. If you're wondering about the western in question, I refer you to the Mel Brooks 1974 masterpiece,**_ **Blazing Saddles.**

 _ **Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM.**_


	10. Chapter 10

_**The idea of getting revenge on the basilisk came from reviewer**_ **jon reeve.** _ **Hermione isn't quite done with those that deprived her of her study time and Harry time second year.**_

 _ **This has now been beta read. Nothing significant has changed but a few details were added and word choices were modified.**_

* * *

 **June 1993**

It was cold, damp, and dreary. Hermione was kneeling on the hard stone, various powders, pastes, tinctures, draughts, and potions all around her. In front of her were dozens of scraps of parchment, all filled with various notes of permutations of ingredients and sequences. Rapidly approaching her fifth hour down in the Chamber of Secrets, even Hermione's legendary patience for learning and experimentation was wearing thin.

Sprinkling out a dried combination of powdered thestral bone, freely given unicorn blood, ground basilisk fang, and phoenix tears, Hermione shaped the combination of potent magical substances into two concentric circles. In between the circles, she used a paint made from phoenix feather dust and basilisk venom to carefully write out a sequence of ancient Norse runes. They made no sense in their native language. They were actually written to replicate ancient Greek pronunciations of phonetic Egyptian using ancient Sumerian grammatical rules. Her proof as to why that exact combination was necessary was buried somewhere in the 120 feet of parchment rolled up near the chamber entrance.

Her writing complete, Hermione drew her wand. Now she had to chant a small ditty in ancient Roman accented Babylonian translating an Atlantean drinking song. Her proof for that necessity was buried in a 170 foot scroll of parchment next to her 120 foot one.

Apparently, Atlantean drinking songs were about little more than life and death. It made a weird sort of sense to certain half mad magicals, but only to them. One The curious just had to look at Hermione's 50 foot proof to see that.

As she reached the fourth stanza, Hermione had to restrain the glee that threatened to disrupt her chanting. For the first time in five hours, the runic circle in front of her glowed with power. By the time she reached the sixteenth stanza, the entire chamber had started to shake. Reaching the thirty-first and final stanza, Hermione was so happy she thought she might burst.

 _Kissing Harry right now might actually cause me to do that!_

The last word disappeared into the rumbling chamber. The circle flashed, blindingly bright. As the spots began to clear from her vision, the chamber stopped shaking. Blinking rapidly, in an effort to clear her vision, Hermione saw a subtle movement in front of her.

The basilisk lived!

Rising to her feet, Hermione slowly walked towards the reanimated creature.

"Can you understand me?"

The basilisk nodded its massive head.

"Are you able to think about attacking me?"

The basilisk shook its massive head.

"Good." Hermione took a deep breath. Striding quickly forward, she pulled out a cricket bat that looked like it had been specially made for Hagrid from somewhere. Holding it high over her head, she aimed for the basilisk's head.

 _Wham!_

"You cost me months of studying!" _Wham!_ "You made me tear a page out of a _library book_!" _Wham!_ "You cost me months of Harry Time!" _Wham! Wham!_ "My Harry had to sit next to a paralyzed me, all sad and depressed for months!" _Wham!_ "You made him have to save that stupid Weasley girl!" _Wham!_ "Now she's going to get all infatuated with my Harry!" _Wham!_ "Now I'm going to have to beat down another skanky bitch trying to get close to my Harry!" _Wham!_ "You hurt my Harry!" _Wham!_ _Wham!_ "You cost me Harry cuddles and kisses!"

 _Wham! Wham! Wham! Wham! Wham!_ _Wham! WHAM! CRACK!_

The reinforced, oversized and now _broken_ cricket bat fell from her hands, clattering on the floor. Taking a deep, calming breath, then a second, and then a few more for good measure, Hermione glared at the badly bruised basilisk.

"Now, you listen and you listen well." The basilisk weakly nodded. "You are going to stay here and be a good pet basilisk for me and my Harry. You'll keep this place clean, safe and private for when we want a bit of alone time. If you don't . . ." Hermione pulled out a fresh, unbroken, Hagrid-sized cricket bat.

The basilisk, despite being blind, somehow knew what she was holding. It nodded furiously.

Hermione broke out in a beaming smile. "Good. I'm glad we had this little talk." Collecting her things, Hermione began her walk towards the entrance of the chamber. "Since you're just a basilisk, I don't have to tell Harry about this little incident. However, since I know you can speak to him, if he finds out from you, well, you'll be _wishing_ for another night like tonight." Hermione's footsteps quieted as she left the chamber.

Hearing the crazy human girl-child walk away, the basilisk sighed in relief. It would rather fight that stupid phoenix and insane human boy-child a thousand times over before facing her again.

Just as it was feeling true relief, her voice echoed through the chamber. "I'll be checking in on you. I want this place nice and tidy when we get back for school next fall."

The basilisk could smell the buildup of a thousand years' worth of dust and mildew caking the walls and floor of the Chamber of secrets, proof of the impossible task before it. It weighed having to face the girl-child again against cleaning the entire chamber. If it could have, the basilisk would have whimpered.

* * *

 _ **Hermione still isn't done with those responsible for second year. There is more to be done.**_

 _ **There are many that have yet to be addressed. The Adorably Violent Hermione will eventually teach the Dursleys a few lessons. Draco will get a few more, as will Snape and Lucius Malfoy. Umbridge is a definite on the To-Do list but maybe not quite yet. Just remember, lots of people on the "Light" side wronged Harry as well. They aren't safe from the Adorably Violent Hermione.**_

 _ **Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM.**_


	11. Chapter 11

_**Before I start today's chapter, I want to thank everyone for the incredible response this experiment of mine has received. In the last 10 days, I've received more reviews than all of my other works combined, more follows than all of my other stories combined, and almost more favorites than any other of my works. In fact, the response has been so overwhelming that I have barely been able to keep up with all of the reviews and PMs. I do read them all and try to respond to as many as I can, but I'm already spending over an hour a day doing just that and time doing that is time I'm not writing. Thank you again, for the incredible show of support.**_

 _ **Fleur is a tenacious sort.**_

* * *

 **December 1994**

Fleur Isabelle Delacour was not one to give up easily. Her marks in school, her prowess on a broom, her selection as the Beauxbatons champion as their Triwizard Tournament representative, the example her little sister Gabrielle followed, everything she did proved that fact. When she was first properly introduced to Harry Potter - he was somehow entered as the fourth champion for the tournament - she wanted to squeal in glee at the opportunity presented to her.

The night that the brunette witch first tried to scare away Fleur had stuck with her. It drove her. If someone was willing to go so far to dissuade others from pursuing Harry Potter, he had to be worth it. The fact that he showed every sign of being resistant to her Allure was almost a negligible factor. He was handsome, one look at his green eyes and any witch would melt into a warm puddle of goo. He was brave, his actions during the first task stood as testament. He was intelligent, his class ranking, second only to the brunette witch, was testament to that. He might be a few years younger than Fleur herself but he was every bit a man and, moreover, every bit a man she could see herself with. A little bit of moulding and she could see him as a man she could spend the rest of her life with.

Thinking back to the gorgeous silvery gown on her bed, Fleur started daydreaming about twirling around the dance floor at the Yule Ball with Harry. He would be so very handsome in his black dress robes. The English and their silly obsession with colored dress robes only proved their general stupidity in Fleur's mind. He would be a powerful dance partner, leading her around the floor, whisking her about, making her bow to his every whim.

Fleur shifted uncomfortably. She might have needed to head back to her room in the carriage if her mind wandered too much further.

Looking around the corner, she saw him standing with his brunette witch friend. The girl was proving to be a constant source of vexation. Every effort Fleur made to get close to him backfired spectacularly somehow. That first night in the darkened room was only the beginning. Tripping hexes, shock wards, vanishing clothes, confundus charms, all things that were just short of the level that might make the Goblet, or the judges, take notice of the interfering little witch and her cheating ways. That foolish girl used them all but Fleur Delacour would not yield! And yet, Fleur had not got any closer to her goal either.

Indeed, Fleur was glad that other witches seemed to be drawing the brunette's ire in the week since the Yule Ball was announced. The two girls from Hufflepuff who had been horribly embarrassed in the Great Hall just the day before were only the latest victims of her ire. However, thanks to those other witches, Fleur was having more success getting close to Harry.

Not that she had actually gotten close enough outside of the Weighing of the Wands and the tent before the first task to have any form of conversation with him.

Putting her mind back on the task at hand, Fleur looked back down the corridor only to see Harry and the brunette walking her way, arm in arm. Resisting the urge to scowl, Fleur kept a pleasant smile on her face. She wanted to lure Harry away from the brunette, not scare him toward her.

"Monsieur Potter," Fleur greeting as politely as she could.

Harry gave her a smile in return. "Miss Delacour."

"May I 'ave a moment of your time?"

Harry's smile grew. Fleur smiled brightly in return.

"I was wondering if you would escort me to ze Yule Ball."

Harry's smile grew even more. Fleur waited for him to answer. Long seconds passed and he had yet to answer her. "Monsieur Potter?"

He remained silent, unmoving. "Monsieur Potter?"

Fleur felt someone nudge her shoulder.

"Monsieur Potter?"

Someone nudged her shoulder again. Fleur swatted the offender's hand away. Finally, the offender grabbed Fleur's shoulders and turned her around.

"What?" Fleur nearly screeched.

It was one of her best friends, Sylvie. "Are you alright, Fleur?"

"Yes I am, I was just . . ." Fleur turned back to Harry only to find him gone. "Wha- Where did he go?"

"Where did who go?"

Fleur frantically looked about. " 'Arry Potter. 'E was standing right 'ere. I was just asking him to escort me to ze Yule Ball."

Sylvie gave her an odd look. "Fleur, you've been standing 'ere for the last half hour. Everyone was getting concerned so one of the witches came and found me. Apparently some boys were talking about 'checking to see if you were alright.' "

Fleur heard the concern in her friend's voice. Veela who were "helped" like that often ended up having to revert to throwing fireballs and emitting ear-splitting screeches, if they regained their senses in time. A crestfallen look came over Fleur's face.

"Zen zat means . . ."

At the end of the corridor, Fleur saw the brunette witch. She had a _butter-wouldn't-melt-in-her-mouth_ smile on her face and gave a mocking wave.

"Oh, she's good," Fleur muttered. With a dark smile, Fleur met the brunette's eyes. "Ze gloves are coming off, leetle witch. Zey are coming off and you will reap what you 'ave sown."

"Fleur, are you alright? There is no one there." Sylvie asked.

Blinking, Fleur turned to her friend. Quickly turning back, she saw that the brunette witch was not at the end of the corridor.

Fleur began a slow clap. "A double layered illusion? Very Impressive. You are even better zan I zought. I must, how do you say, step up my game. I will prove I am ze better witch. 'E will be mine."

Fleur marched off towards the Beauxbatons carriage, ignoring the calls of her best friend behind her. She had plans to make, letters to write, and a Harry Potter to seduce. If the brunette was willing to show off so much to keep him, he was obviously even better than Fleur had thought.

* * *

 _ **A tamer seeming Hermione. Don't let that fool you. Fleur is a Triwizard Tournament champion. There are rules, unstated, that protect her from the Adorably Violent Hermione's usual actions.**_

 _ **Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM. Personally, I'm failing in coming up with a sufficient amount of ideas for first, third, and sixth years. I have several, but some of the ideas you readers come up with are pure gold, so I'd like to see what you all can think up.**_


	12. Chapter 12

_**The first of many shots at the Ministry. It's only right that they value Harry as much as Hermione does.**_

* * *

 **August 1993**

Florean Fortescue was not a young man. He had owned and operated his Ice Cream Parlour since before Harry Potter's parents attended Hogwarts. Florean had seen many students come and go. Many he liked, many he despised, but he served them all equally because he was a business owner.

The son of a muggle dairy farmer and a witch, Florean grew up around all things dairy. He had spent his youth milking cows every morning by hand, making cheeses for his father to take and sell, and making ice cream treats for his little sister. She had long since passed, a childhood illness taking her well before her time, but it was the joy of making those treats for her that had led Florean to open his ice cream parlour. There was nothing like it in the British Wizarding World and muggle options would likely perform poorly given the differing palates. He spent years developing his recipes to cater to the palates of young witches and wizards. Pumpkin, Butterbeer, Sugar Quill, even a derivation of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans. He hated the stuff, personally, but it was a top seller with the Pureblood children.

Looking up, he saw the young Harry Potter wandering the alley. Ever since four days prior when Minister Fudge dropped him off with barely so much as a "How do you do" Florean had kept an eye out for the young wizard. The other shopkeepers had done the same. While not the only one to lose almost everything in He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's war, young Harry had suffered. The fame heaped upon him only made things worse.

Florean shook his head. As grateful as he was that the war was over, the Boy-Who-Lived was only fifteen months old when his surviving the Killing Curse vanquished You-Know-Who. Sales had been fantastic during the weeks that followed, setting Florean up for years to come, but it seemed as if everyone overlooked what had happened to Harry.

The boy had simply disappeared.

Professor Dumbledore had reassured everyone that Harry was safe and well cared for but Harry's first visit to the alley two years prior had painted a drastically different picture. He was frightfully small for his age, shying away from almost everyone even while being completely wide-eyed at the wonder around him. It screamed that Harry had never seen any sort of magic before nor had he been well cared for as the Headmaster had claimed.

Thankfully, the next year, Harry looked much better. He was as tall as he should be, and looked an easy two stone heavier. He stood tall, proud, and was gracious to those who spoke to him. He was humble when people tried to thank him and blushed almost constantly thanks to the young brunette witch that hung on his arm and whispered in his ear. It was rare to see two young magicals as close as Harry and his companion appeared to be. It was rather refreshing to see.

Three days ago, Florean had been shocked to find Harry wandering around the Alley by himself. The papers were still filled with the news Sirius Black had escaped from Azkaban and, if the rumour was true, had muttered about how his target was at Hogwarts. Before Florean could approach the young boy, the brunette witch from the year before came bolting out of the Leaky Cauldron and took a flying leap at Harry.

The young witch had promptly checked him over for any injury, hugged him tightly and laid a few probably age inappropriate kisses on him. Harry had done what every involved man before him had done before and spent the better part of an hour placating her. Somewhere in his storytelling, Harry had said something that obviously upset the young witch. It appeared to be nothing he had done as the young witch's anger was focused elsewhere and he was doing his best to calm her down.

Florean had gestured to the two youngsters, inviting them into his shop. After a free scoop of real vanilla ice cream, something most magicals would have likely spit out in disgust given its muggle origins, the two were in much better spirits. At least, the young witch looked far less likely to go on a murder spree. Being careful to not be overly obvious, Florean had listened in as Harry had talked the young witch down from her excited state.

"Hermione, it's fine. I'm here. I'm safe. And no charges are going to be filed for my accidental magic episode."

That caught Florean's attention. Accidental magic at age 13 was extremely rare and almost always involved extreme duress.

"But Harry, the Minister just abandoned you here. Even a cursory look at the papers are talking about how Sirius Black is most likely on the hunt for you."

Harry had replied, "I know Hermione but there is little I can do about it. They're paying to put me up in the Leaky Cauldron and made a point to tell me me not to go anywhere out of the public eye."

The young witch, Hermione, had fumed. "It's like just some political ploy to keep you in the public eye. If they were actually concerned about your safety, you'd be under lock and key in some secure facility, or at least have an armed guard following you around."

Hermione had a point, Florean had thought. It was very odd for Harry to be so exposed when every indication pointed to Harry being Sirius Black's target. The man was imprisoned for supporting You-Know-Who, for betraying Harry's parents, and his subsequent murder of Peter Pettigrew and twelve muggles that the magical papers never named.

Harry had pulled her into a firm embrace. "What do you expect me to do? I'm a thirteen year old kid. They won't listen to me if I point that out to them. All I can do is do my best to stay safe on my own terms."

Florean had strained to overhear Hermione's response. "We'll see about that." He was admittedly amused by the girl's tenacity and apparent fervent belief she could do something to change the mind of someone like Minister Fudge but he admired her dedication to her young man.

Today was the first time since then that Florean had seen Harry. To his surprise, he was being escorted around the alley by four senior Aurors and the Minister himself, along with the Minister's personal protection detail. It boggled Florean's mind as to how the change came about.

The Minister, seeming to have finished up his conversation with young Harry, looked back towards the Leaky Cauldron and paled. Florean looked in the same direction to see Hermione, stone-faced, eyeing the Minister.

Minister Fudge promptly excused himself and made for the nearest Floo.

With him gone, the young witch approached Harry at a much more sedate pace than the last time Florean had seen her. Giving Harry a simple kiss on the cheek, she wrapped herself around his arm and asked him to escort her to Flourish and Blotts. He gave her a happy grin and told her that he would be glad to. He turned to state their destination to the Aurors, who looked hesitant to follow.

Florean noticed Hermione directing a glare in the Aurors' direction. For some reason, the Aurors suddenly paled and stopped their hesitating. Florean smiled and nodded to himself.

It was good to see public servants concerned about young Harry.

* * *

 _ **Light on dialogue, but I feel more exposition suits the perspective better.**_

 _ **Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM.**_


	13. Chapter 13

_**To those of you who have written reviews or sent me PMs and have not heard anything from me, please be patient. I do read every review and have tried to respond to as many as possible but I only have so much time in a day. Trying to post daily eats up a lot of that time. I will get back to you even if just to say "Thanks for the review" eventually.**_

 _ **Thank you to everyone for the overwhelming show of support.**_

* * *

 **August 1995**

Dolores Umbridge considered herself the consummate professional. As the Senior Undersecretary to the Minister for Magic, she carried out her duties to the best of her abilities She used her initiative to attempt to anticipate her boss' needs. She resolved issues that were not worthy of his notice. She protected him from the press, the populace, and himself.

It was rare that she was called into a closed door meeting with Minister Fudge, her current destination, having no idea what was to be discussed. A few weeks prior, she had tried to resolve the Potter issue by sending two Dementors to his muggle home. No one would ever be able to trace the order back to her, given how deeply it was buried in the minutiae of a miscellaneous document, misfiled, of course.

Cornelius had immediately overturned Potter's automatic expulsion for his second offence at violating the regulations enacted to satisfy the Ministry of Magic's Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery. The Minister had even gone so far as to send a personal letter of apology for the mix up. When she had pushed for the Potter boy to be expelled anyway due to the her belief that Potter would only cause more problems in the future, Cornelius had baulked. Dolores had never seen him so pale at any suggestion of hers.

Worried, but not overly so, Dolores strode into the Minister's office. Knowing that his ditz of a secretary would announce Dolores's arrival, she patiently waited. Had it been even two years prior, she would have berated the younger witch for taking too much time, but something had changed.

Two years before, Cornelius had arrived at the Ministry one morning and began enacting sweeping changes. Dolores remembered his first act was to order a protective detail for Harry Potter during the Sirius Black escape fiasco. When Amelia Bones had informed him that she didn't have any spare personnel, he asked what it would take. Within an hour, the Department of Magical Law Enforcement had a twenty percent budget increase. Twenty percent! Dolores could hardly believe it. Proper witches and wizards did not need policing of their actions or intruding on their private lives which was why she tried so hard to tighten the reins on the DMLE. Cornelius would hear none of it.

After that, many of the long-held hiring restrictions on those from lesser families were loosened. Those restrictions had been in place for decades following the election of Nobby Leach, the first, and only, muggleborn Minister for Magic. Any reforms that man had tried to push through were erased so completely that the only legacy of his holding the office was his name on a plaque and in various footnotes in books. The man had tried to get wizards to adopt suits for goodness' sake! Dolores, like any proper wizard or witch, knew that the only proper attire for a magical were robes.

Finally, after a seeming eternity of waiting – in the old days, she would have just walked right into Cornelius's office – Dolores was informed the Minister was expecting her. With a polite knock, she entered.

"Cornelius, you sent for me?"

The Minister for Magic looked up from the piles of parchment on his desk. Dolores considered it an odd sight. Prior to two years ago, he barely looked at anything that crossed his desk, trusting her to tell him what to sign and where.

"Yes, I did. Close the door and sit down, Dolores."

Following his instructions, Dolores sat down across from him, pulling out a quill and some parchment for notes. She idly noted his favourite lime green bowler was nowhere in sight.

"No, put those away!" Cornelius nearly shrieked. "There is to be no record of this meeting in any way, shape or form. After you leave, my secretary is even going to overwrite your name in the appointment book with some mindless drivel."

Taken aback, Dolores complied with his demand.

"For goodness' sake, what is this about, Cornelius?"

Cornelius looked about nervously, as if Morgana herself was out to get him. "Dumbledore has not been able to fill the Defense Against the Dark Arts post this year. As such, he and the Hogwarts Board of Governors have agreed to the enactment of Educational Decree Twenty-Two, that will grant the Ministry of Magic the ability to appoint someone to a vacant teaching position if, and only if, Hogwarts cannot find a way to fill it internally or through recruitment."

"That's wonderful, Cornelius. The Ministry is long overdue in getting a bit more influence there."

The Minister flinched. "No! No, not more influence. We are helping out in a time of need to provide for the education of our young wizards and witches."

"But surely, after this past June, we need to do something to get a handle on this Dumbledore and Potter situation."

If Dolores had thought Cornelius had been pale that morning when she suggested he expel Potter regardless of his earlier actions, she now thought ghosts had more colour than her boss's face.

"Stop that line of thought, right now, Dolores." With a weary exhalation, Cornelius sank back into his chair. "At the moment, Amelia, her staff, Rufus, and all of his Aurors are busy with other tasks. As such, no one qualified from the DMLE can step in to fill the vacancy."

"In that case, who are you going to ask to teach there?"

Cornelius gave her a stern look.

"You."

Dolores went wide eyed. If he was asking her to teach at Hogwarts for the year, that meant she would be entirely out of the political arena for the same amount of time. It would cripple her influence with certain parties to be out of the loop for so long. Plus, she could barely tolerate children, even those of the right sort.

"Cornelius, what are you talking about? I'm no teacher and you need me here."

"There are two main reasons. First, we need good PR after the disaster that was the Triwizard Tournament this past year. Working with Hogwarts to help them educate the youths of our world is a good avenue to that end. Second, you are the only senior ministry official that scored adequately on your Defense NEWTs to conceivably take the role. Everyone else qualified is even less indispensable than you for day to day activities."

Begrudgingly accepting her fate, Dolores nodded in compliance.

"Good," Cornelius continued. "Now, there are some things you need to be aware of. I know you're concerned about Dumbledore and Potter. If, and I do mean if, you can acquire evidence, without doing anything unlawful or illegal, that any member of the staff there should not be, you are to pass it on directly to me."

Dolores was ecstatic at the opening Cornelius was giving her. A perfect opportunity to use everything at her disposal to weed out those Dumbledore worshippers and possibly even Dumbledore or Potter themselves. Besides, despite his instructions, what he didn't know wouldn't hurt him.

"Additionally, you are not to do anything to Harry Potter or his girlfriend Hermione Granger, no matter what you find. In fact, you shouldn't go looking for anything and forget anything you do find."

Dolores had to blink at that. "Why, sir? What makes them exempt? What makes them so special?"

Cornelius broke out in a cold sweat. Taking a moment to gather himself, he then gave Dolores a look that spoke of nothing but pity.

"If you choose to ignore me on this, I will not protect you from her."

"Her?"

Suddenly all a-fluster, Cornelius rose, looking all about. "I've said too much. You have to leave. Now. Remember, this meeting never took place. This conversation never happened." He was already pushing her out the door as he spoke his last words to her. He promptly slammed his office door shut behind her.

Something was off, Dolores knew it. It had something to do with Potter or possibly his muggleborn girlfriend. Something was scaring Cornelius. Dolores pondered the possibilities, wondering if perhaps blackmail was involved. She had done everything she could over the last half decade to protect him from such attempts. Apparently, she would have to do so again. It was time to find out just what Potter and Granger had on Cornelius.

Tomorrow, she would report to Hogwarts and begin her task. Potter and Granger would suffer for daring to dream of threatening the Minister for Magic and, by extension, the almighty and infallible Ministry of Magic, itself.

* * *

 _ **This is more setup than anything actually done by our Adorably Violent Hermione. Dolores Umbridge presents such a tempting target that I feel she deserves a bit more thorough treatment.**_

 _ **Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM.**_


	14. Chapter 14

_**Many characters will get their due. It will just take me a bit longer to get to unleashing the Adorably Violent Hermione on them.**_

* * *

 **November 1994**

Charlie Weasley awoke bright and early the day after the first task of the Triwizard Tournament. He was tired, sore, was covered in small cuts, bruises, and burns. The day before had been exhausting and a near disaster. Charlie had to shake his head at the stupidity of sending the Champions against nesting mother dragons. The reserve he worked for had rules for that exact situation and it involved never approaching in a team of less than four. Certain breeds called for as many as eight veteran keepers. Seventeen year olds had no business going up against the four dragons the reserve had sent.

First there was the Diggory kid. He proved he had a decent head on his shoulders, relying on distractions against the Swedish Short-Snout. Charlie often thought of them as hyperactive puppies that had a tendency to chase after anything interesting. Diggory had several close calls, being a bit too "interesting" himself, but managed to get out with only a few minor burns. Charlie realized that "minor" was relative. The kid was lucky he wasn't half cooked.

After that, there was the French bird. Charlie sighed a bit. She was one bloody good looking woman. He'd move back in with his mother for a chance to talk with the Beauxbatons champion. Being home for the few days surrounding the Quidditch World Cup had reminded him just how glad he was to be a continent away. Charlie did love his mother but she treated him like he was five, at the oldest, and that was being generous. He was a fully qualified adult wizard who had worked and lived in another country for five years, ever since he had graduated in June of '89.

Shaking his head to clear his mind of family drama, Charlie's thoughts returned to the delectable Miss Delacour and her performance yesterday against the Welsh Green. She had lucked out, given that none of the other breeds were susceptible to her tactic of putting it to sleep with a charm. Charlie hoped she had had other plans in case she had drawn one of the other breeds, especially after Hagrid had brought Maxime around before the task.

Thinking back to that night, Charlie could have sworn he even saw Karkaroff slipping away in the night about the time Hagrid and his date had departed. It was a good thing, in Charlie's mind, that cheating was such a big part of the Tournament. Otherwise, they'd have been needing four urns for the Champions' ashes.

Returning his thoughts to the first task, Charlie fumed. Krum had been next and his method had bloody well pissed off all of the keepers. Tending to a broken talon, or even wing, was one thing. Getting a 10 ton dragon to hold still and drink the horrible potion that would heal the eye injuries Krum had inflicted had taken the entire on-site staff. The rest of the dragon keepers didn't care that Krum was a world-famous Seeker. They wanted to take the pillock's wand away and toss him in the cage with the Chinese Fireball he had maimed.

Then there was Harry Potter. His strategy was brilliantly simple and yet completely innovative. He had first tried to summon the egg. That had earned him some mocking laughter from the crowd. However, Harry didn't seem to notice. He simply conjured a bedsheet and a small wooden frame before laying the cloth over the frame. Not getting anywhere close to the Hungarian Horntail, Harry had walked the perimeter of the enclosure, and cast a second summoning charm, this time on his conjurations. They zipped across the arena, the sheet engulfed the golden egg, and continued on its path to Harry. He had likely used some selective sticking charm because none of the other eggs had been caught by the bedsheet. That alone was impressive, especially for a fourth year. Then, Harry had simply grabbed the balled-up bedsheet containing the golden egg that was hovering in front of him and made his way over to the tent.

It lacked flair but it kept him out of harm's reach the entire time. At least, until the dragon realized that Harry had barely paid her any mind and decided to be insulted.

Charlie grimaced recalling the chaos that had followed. The Horntail had broken free from the chain that kept her grounded. She chose to lunge after Harry, maw gaping wide to eat him, crashing into the stands when Harry had gracefully dodged the beast with barely so much as a sidewards glance. That had enraged the dragon even more. Before she had a chance to do anything else, though, Harry had conjured an overly large cricket bat.

At first, Charlie had thought it was a Beater's bat but a second look, and lots of time around muggle girls both in Britain and abroad, had educated him enough to recognize the differences. When the dragon saw Harry with the cricket bat, she actually paused. Harry had cleared his throat, and pointed to his girlfriend in the crowd.

After that, Charlie had witnessed something he never thought he would ever see and doubted he would see ever again. The dragon had skittered back in abject terror.

Sometime after they had gotten all the dragons back into their pens, Charlie's boss had asked him to approach Harry, since Ron claimed to be one of Harry's friends. If his boss had asked Charlie, he would have said that Harry tolerated Ron's presence, but ignored him just like the dragon.

Bringing his thoughts back to the present, Charlie finally arrived at the pens. First, he checked up on the Chinese Fireball. Its eyes had healed well enough, though it would never see as well as it had before. The Swedish Short-Snout and the Welsh Green were fine, if a bit hungrier than usual. Finally, he approached the Hungarian Horntail pen.

Apparently, Charlie was the last one up.

Every other keeper from the reserve was wrangling the dragon, trying to splint and cast countless obviously broken bones. Her wings were bent all out of shape at previously impossible angles. Her face was badly beaten, much like a man's after being on the losing end of a pub brawl. Her talons, spikes and even its teeth were ground down smoother than river stones. The only saving grace was that she had no open wounds or cuts.

Someone had gone to great lengths to inflict great, but not lasting, pain on the dragon.

Rushing to help, Charlie called out, "What the hell happened?"

"We don't know. We woke up this morning as the poor g- it looked even worse than this!" one of his colleagues answered.

"Do we have any idea who or what did that?"

The team of keepers tending the dragon froze. With a silent conversation amongst themselves, one finally split off, pulling Charlie to the side. Once far enough away, he began a whispered conversation.

"We don't have a clue." Holding up a hand to forestall any comment Charlie might have made, the man continued. "What we do know is that it was likely a witch."

"How do you figure that?"

The man lowered his voice even further. "Because every time someone mentions witch, girl, female, anything along those lines, she tenses up, terrified of something. Almost like a sheep in a pen of dragons."

Looking back at the dragon in question, Charlie was completely baffled. She was one of their fiercest, most territorial dragons on the reserve. The fact that she had deigned to let a male breed her was practically a miracle. To see her so skittish now was almost heart breaking. It might actually have been heart breaking if it weren't for the scar in his side the size of his boot from one of her now ground down tail spikes.

"The only other thing we know, is that she was acting weird after facing Potter yesterday. Whatever he said or did made her wary. Not wary enough, I'd say."

The two men talked for a bit longer before Charlie's boss came over and asked him to see if Potter would be willing to talk. Whatever he did to get the dragon to obey the day before was something the reserve would pay a few cartfuls of galleons to know. The savings on healing costs alone would cover that in less than a year.

Charlie made his way up the familiar path to the castle. It was breakfast time, so he headed straight for the Great Hall. It was mostly empty, as the students were likely sleeping in after the excitement during the first task and the parties that probably followed. However, Harry and his girlfriend Hermione were there.

"Harry, mind if I have a few words?"

The fourth Triwizard Tournament Champion looked up at him. "Charlie Weasley, right?"

Charlie smiled. "That's right. Listen, about yesterday, my boss was hoping to talk to you about whatever you did to get the Horntail to back down. If you'd be willing to tell us what you did, it could save us a lot on healing. She's a right terror, usually, so it would be worth a lot to the reserve to have some way of getting her to be a little tamer."

Harry didn't answer Charlie. Rather, Harry looked at Hermione and smiled. The girl returned his with a beaming smile of her own before cuddling up as close as she could.

After a few moments of awkward silence, Charlie cleared his throat.

The next thing he knew, Charlie was in the forest and running like Morgana herself was after him. When he finally stopped to catch his breath, his boss was worriedly looking at him.

"What the hell, Charlie? You're looking almost as terrified as our girl over there was yesterday."

Breathing heavily, Charlie looked at his boss. "Whatever you do boss, don't interrupt Harry's girlfriend."

"Potter's girlfriend? What are you on about?"

"Potter didn't scare the dragon. She did. From the stands. With. One. Bloody. Look. She just turned that same look on me when I interrupted her to talk to Harry. I'm worried she might come after us now."

"What's her name?"

"Hermione Granger."

Charlie had never known his boss was a practicing Catholic prior to that moment.

* * *

 _ **The Adorably Violent Hermione's reputation is growing.**_

 _ **Normally, here is where I'd say, "Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM" But I've run into a small issue. I've received so many ideas that I don't have the time to properly sort through them to give appropriate credit to the reviewer that thought of them. My beta reader has gone above and beyond to help me during all of this but I'm asking for a few people to help out in addition. If you're interested, please PM me.**_

 _ **Now I'll say it. Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM.**_


	15. Chapter 15

_**Luna is a lovely, if odd, girl.**_

 _ **So many of you have requested or contributed ideas for a Luna scene including KrisB-71854, kanazak, Pax Humana, pfanna, miletta101, trood, thepkrmgc, Valentine Meikin, These Heroes We Shall Remember, and willow. If I missed your name, I apologize.**_

* * *

 **November 1995**

"Hello, Harry Potter."

Harry looked up from the open book in his hands. Standing in the corridor before him was a Ravenclaw, a year younger, with dirty blonde hair and slightly protruding pale eyes. Around her neck was a homemade necklace consisting of Butterbeer caps held together with silvery string. Hanging from her ears were was looked to be small, fresh radishes. Harry had to wonder if they were real radishes since they appeared identical to the ones hanging from her ears months before when he first met Luna Lovegood.

Giving the girl a smile, Harry returned the greeting. "Hello, Luna. How are you today?"

"Quite well. I got a letter this morning from Daddy asking me to review an article he hopes to publish in the next edition."

Nodding, Harry thought back to his first encounter with Luna Lovegood. He had boarded the train before fifth year began, sitting with Hermione as per his usual habit. Hermione had curled up in his lap, leaving an obviously upset Crookshanks stuck in his carrier. Hermione was busy dreamily murmuring her devious plans for Harry that night. He could only chuckle as her machinations to sneak into his bed and have her wicked way with him were aired to the otherwise empty compartment.

Without so much as a knock, the door to the compartment opened to reveal an odd looking girl. Her hair was a bit of a mess, tangled, hanging down to her waist. Her robes were mussed as if she had hurriedly tried to straighten them after something messed them about. Her entire focus was on the copy of _The Quibbler_ , upside down, in her hands.

She did not pay Harry or Hermione any mind. The girl had sat down, making stilted conversation, identifying Harry before introducing herself as Luna Lovegood. Hermione was patently ignored. When Luna had laughed at something Harry had said, funny but not nearly so funny as to warrant the amount of laughter that erupted from Luna, who had held her sides and nearly fallen from her seat, Hermione's head snapped around to look at the compartment's third occupant.

Fuming, Hermione had brandished her wand, and fired a few spells in Luna's direction. Harry had tensed when he felt her pull Hermione pull her wand. He was going to have to have another talk about her returning shoot-first-ask-questions-never mentality again. The last time she had let loose like that, Cedric Diggory had ended up sparkling as if he had bathed in glitter, attracting the attention of every other girl nearby who promptly swarmed him. All the older Triwizard Champion had done was congratulate Harry for winning the tournament.

Last Harry had heard, Cedric had spent almost the entire summer holiday in St. Mungo's for psychiatric treatment following that incident.

Miraculously, when Luna had fallen over on her side, she had managed to avoid all three spells that Hermione had in the Ravenclaw's direction. Harry had promptly, very quietly, reminded Hermione that if all three had hit, she would have been without kisses and cuddles for a week. A very unhappy Hermione had burrowed back into his chest, refusing to acknowledge Luna's presence after that.

After that, Harry had bumped into Luna about every other day. Hermione had been very unhappy with the development and began plotting more and more convoluted ways in which to properly punish the blonde for trying to get close to Harry. He found it so adorable that Hermione was so possessive of his affection. However, every attempt Hermione made to embarrass or dissuade the girl failed completely.

At first, Luna had always been a step ahead of wherever Hermione aimed. Several innocent bystanders, innocent in Harry's eyes at least, had caught the brunt of Hermione's wrath because Luna had somehow always needed to skip just before the spell would have hit her, or dropped to her knees to pick up something that had fallen from her hands.

Finally, on one occasion, Hermione had been so angry that she missed so badly that the suit of armour behind Luna had fallen to pieces from the force of the spell. The helmet had rolled halfway down the corridor before coming to rest. Half a second later, an older Ravenclaw, who had been hiding around a corner, had stepped out while Luna had her back turned to watch the rest of the armour fall all about.

The older Ravenclaw had promptly stumbled over the helmet, somehow getting her foot stuck in the process. She had then proceeded to fall forward, attempting to catch herself with her hands, only to plant her hands on the breastplate. The girl somehow had enough forward momentum to slide across the stone floor to the stairwell opposite her original hiding place. Thankfully, the stairs were cooperating that day and gave her a surface to slide down. Harry had been unable to see what had happened next but the loud crash caused him to investigate the aftermath. The sight of a concussed Professor Umbridge having her head stuck between a concussed Professor Snape's legs, his head was stuck between her legs, would forever be held in infamy thanks to a quick snapshot captured by Colin Creevey. The Ravenclaw girl that had crashed into them was unconscious amidst a pile of armour pieces that had cushioned her as well at artfully preserving her modesty.

After a month-long comedy of errors, Harry began to call Luna a friend. Hermione had objected at first but Luna had made no overture of romantic intent towards Harry, thus protecting her from most of Hermione's wrath under Section 5 of their agreement as she no longer fit the established definition of "skanky bitch" as provided under Section 2.

Harry brought his mind back to the present. "What's this article about?"

Luna's bright smile met his inquiry. Ever since Hermione had begun to hunt after Luna, Luna's clothes had begun appearing less ruffled. Her hair was neater, as if she were only now properly combing it. A lot of her general quirkiness had vanished as she spent more time talking to Harry and, on occasion, Hermione. Luna also seemed to bask in their presence as much as she could and was always happy whenever one of them engaged her in conversation.

"It's a summary of the results of our Snorkack hunt from this past summer. We didn't find them but we did find tracks. After your suggestion, I wrote Daddy and he made a second trip to get photographs and casts of them. They don't match any observed magical animal in Newt Scamander's _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_. He also followed Hermione's suggestion and bought muggle books on animal tracks and couldn't find a match in those, either. Perhaps we didn't find what we were looking for but we did find something."

Harry smiled at her. Luna was a much happier girl now than she had been on the train that day months before. "I see you have a few photographs there, have you shown them to Hermione to see if she knows what they are? She seems to know everything or, if she doesn't, she knows where to look to find out."

Luna gave Harry another bright smile. "I was actually going to find her and ask if she could help me go over Daddy's article." Luna's smile dimmed considerably before her next question. "Do you think she'd mind looking at the photographs, too?"

Harry's heart nearly broke at the sad, unsure look on Luna's face. He managed to keep a smile on his face to mask his true feelings. "I'm sure she would be happy to. Just make sure you ask her to meet you during her designated Luna time. You know how she is when you interrupt her study or Harry time."

A much happier girl skipped away.

"Hermione, you can come out now," Harry called to the corridor.

Harry's girlfriend came out from an alcove where she was hiding. "You were intentionally standing in my line of fire weren't you?"

Sighing, Harry opened his arms to Hermione, who promptly rushed forward into his embrace. "Yes, I was. You've got to stop doing this, Hermione. Luna is just a sweet girl who wants friends. You know she thinks the world of you so I don't understand why you keep trying to curse, hex, jinx, or otherwise punish her for something she isn't trying to do."

Hermione muttered something into his chest that Harry didn't quite catch.

"What was that?" Harry asked.

Pulling her head back slightly, Hermione tried again. "I said that she's eating into my Harry time."

Harry tightened his arms around her. "I know you think that but that's why I made you designate a small period everyday where she could approach you. I also know that you do/actually like spending time with her since the two of you are on a completely different level academically than the rest of us. And don't try to deny it."

Hermione grumbled a bit but Harry caught the corners of her mouth curling upwards at his words. After a brief moment, Hermione whispered, "She also somehow keeps dodging everything I try. It's a matter of honour, now. She's the only one who's ever got away."

Harry just chuckled. "Yeah, I have no idea how she does it, either. And still, somehow, you keep putting Ravenclaw girls in the infirmary whenever you miss Luna."

* * *

 _ **Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM.**_


	16. Chapter 16

_**No one is safe from the Adorably Violent Hermione, not even family friends.**_

* * *

 **July 1995**

Remus looked at his breakfast companion. Sirius was ghastly pale, far more so than usual after his twelve year stay in Azkaban. Most wizards and witches would call the place Hell on Earth and still be understating how horrific a stay there was. Yet, Sirius looked like he'd be more comfortable back in his tiny, dingy cell in Azkaban than sitting at the breakfast table in 12 Grimmauld Place.

The world had changed just a month before. Somehow, an unknown Death Eater had acquired a single drop of Harry's blood, allowing them to give the wandering spirit of You-Know-Who a new body. Professor Dumbledore had immediately reformed his group, the Order of the Phoenix, to combat the resurrected enemy but every indication was that the Order was completely ineffectual. Remus idly mused that a person could go so far as to say the Order was entirely unnecessary.

All gathered intelligence pointed to You-Know-Who receiving far less support than anyone had predicted. The Malfoys were just one example where a family had made a very public show of being out of the country for the summer. Snape had attended a few Death Eater gatherings, at Professor Dumbledore's veiled insistence, only to report that over half the usual crowd was doing everything they could to avoid siding with You-Know-Who. In fact, the only truly valuable intelligence that Snape had shared was that almost all of the suspected Death Eater crowd spoke in whispers of a terror far worse than anything You-Know-Who could ever conceive of being.

Professor Dumbledore had sought more information but had come up empty with every explored avenue. Even with his powers and contacts as Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot and Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards, there was nothing to learn. Whatever entity that was causing greater fear in the Death Eater crowd than You-Know-Who could was, for all practical purposes, less than a ghost. Anyone who knew anything was more terrified of speaking, writing or even acknowledging any form of reference to the entity's existence than they were of saying You-Know-Who's real name.

However, at the moment, Sirius looked like he had just come from a face to face meeting with that mysterious entity.

"What the hell, Sirius?"

Sirius looked up at him.

"I've seen Death, Remus. I've seen Death."

Startled, Remus debated forcing his friend to go see Madam Pomfrey and maybe even Professor Dumbledore as well. "What are you talking about?"

"I was just upstairs."

Remus smirked, feeling relieved. "And what? You saw Molly sans dressing gown?"

When Sirius didn't crack a smile, Remus's worry came back threefold.

"No, Remus. I saw Hermione."

Remus looked hard at his friend. "Sirius, you're almost twenty years her senior. I can understand not being attracted to a fifteen year old girl, but to call her 'Death' is a bit over the top."

Sirius shook his head. "It wasn't that. I told her that Professor Dumbledore had restricted contact with Harry."

Instantly, Remus had a flashback to his year of teaching at Hogwarts. He had witnessed the horrific aftermath of countless events where Hermione Granger was suspected to be involved in. Students by the dozen condemned for weeks to Madam Pomfrey's care. Draco Malfoy missing for a month only to have night terrors for the remaining months of the school year. Hagrid's Blast-Ended Skrewts with their blasting ends plugged up so thoroughly a single blast would cause them to explode. It took Dumbledore himself two months to undo the spell work on them although there were several accidents involving both creature and pupil before he could accomplish it. It was still something that could cause Hagrid to break out in massive sobbing fits if even alluded to.

After a long, pregnant silence, Remus turned his gaze to Sirius. "Do you have another house we can hide in?"

Sirius's look of terror only grew. "She said if I tried to run, it would make what happened to Peter look like a slap on the wrist."

Remus gulped. "How?"

"She said neutering us without any kind of anesthesia would be day one."

Remus whimpered. "And day two?"

"She'd regrow them and do it again. Then, she would add something to our punishment."

"For how long?"

"One day for every day we weren't there for Harry."

For the first time in their lives both grown men, veteran pranksters and mischief makers, survivors of decades of fighting and other horrors, wept in abject fear.

Amidst his tears, Remus looked to Sirius. "So running is out. Is there anything we can do?"

In between near hysterical breaths resulting from the question, Sirius explained the dire nature of their situation "She said it'd be a week for every day Dumbledore attempts to restrict her from contacting Harry."

After a brief pause, both Marauders bolted from the breakfast table for the Floo.

Left in their wake was a disgruntled House-elf muttering to himself. "Kreacher needs to have a talk with Missy Granger. Maybe she would be open to trading ideas."

Kreacher popped up to the room where Hermione was staying. Upon seeing Hermione dreamily sighing while she stared at a full sized poster of Harry, the elf decided that not interrupting the witch was the better part of valour.

* * *

 _ **Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM.**_


	17. Chapter 17

_**Our first direct follow up.**_

* * *

 **July 1995**

Harry was sitting in his bedroom at Number 4 Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey. It was the smallest bedroom in the house, tucked away in the back corner of the upstairs, ignored by all except those who had it as their specific destination.

Prior to receiving the letter that changed his life, Harry had slept in the cupboard under the stairs, made friends with the spiders he shared the room with, and had an altogether miserable existence. After receiving that letter, Harry had been moved into what was then his cousin Dudley's second bedroom, where the blubbering oaf kept all of his broken toys. It was a significant improvement for Harry. He had outgrown the cupboard resulting in him having to sleep curled up on the same thin mattress he had had for his entire life.

After his first year, Harry had been dreading returning to the Dursleys. Despite his life threatening adventures, Hogwarts was a much better environment. Almost all of that difference was due to a single reason: Hermione Granger. Two months into the school year, he had saved her life. That Halloween was the date Harry used to separate his old and new lives.

Hermione rapidly became everything to him. She had helped him study, encouraged him when he struggled, rewarded him with hugs and, on special occasions, kisses on the cheek. He had quickly shot to the top of their year, second only to her.

The only thing he might have changed was how he had very few friends outside her and none of them were female. Hermione was self-admittedly of the jealous variety and it manifested most when it came to Harry. It had proved to be frustrating at times but it was because of her that he managed to avoid the worst of the potentially deadly situations that seemed to happen every year. She was also solely responsible for him driving himself academically to be the best he could be.

Her first visit to the Dursley's had resulted in drastic changes around the house. Harry's room was now tastefully decorated and furnished with decent furniture, rather than the worst dregs his Uncle Vernon could find. Harry's family had started being cordial with him though there was too much history for there ever to be anything along the lines of genuine affection between them. He volunteered to help with the chores to make things easier between the four residents but that summer also saw Dudley having to perform his first chores ever. In the years since, the situation had not improved any further on the whole but the Dursley family was always more tolerable whenever Hermione's name was mentioned.

Currently, Hermione was curled up in his lap having apparently had a very frustrating time the day before. Harry had not managed to get the whole story from her but she was doing much better after the last few hours of them together. It was unusual for Harry since she rarely held anything back when he asked. In those rare cases, it was always about some kind of birthday present or other surprise.

Harry was about to try and get the story out of her again when there was a knock on his bedroom door.

"Come in," Harry called out.

To Harry's surprise, his headmaster, Professor Dumbledore, entered the bedroom. The older man looked surprised at Hermione's presence but made no immediate comment.

"Harry, I've come to escort you to your godfather," he proclaimed.

Dumbfounded, Harry took a few moments for his thoughts to catch up to reality. "Um, okay. I can be packed in about five minutes, less than that if Hermione helps."

Professor Dumbledore waved his wand and all of Harry's things began to pack themselves in his school trunk. Annoyed at the presumption of the headmaster, a scowl formed on Harry's face.

Five minutes later, Harry, Hermione and the headmaster were standing in a run down part of London, surrounded by buildings with tired exteriors and broken windows. The headmaster had Harry read from a small scrap of parchment.

Looking across the street, Harry saw two buildings move apart, as if reality had decided to make more of itself between them. "Ah, the Fidelius charm," Harry commented. "An odd application but I suppose it works for hiding locations as well."

Harry and Hermione proceeded across the street and into the decrepit house, ignoring the brief confused expression on their headmaster's face. Entering, Harry noticed a portrait on his right, opposite a garish umbrella stand that looked to be made of a troll's leg.

"Good evening, Miss Granger. I take it you are now here for the duration of the summer?" a rather regal looking woman in the portrait asked."

"Yes, Walburga," Hermione replied. "Excepting the occasional outing to spend some time with my parents, Harry and I will be here."

The woman in the portrait nodded. "Very good then."

A voice came from further down the entry hall. "I still need to figure out how you got her to be so bloody polite." Harry looked to see Sirius watching them. A few short strides later and Harry was giving his godfather a firm hug. Hermione walked right past the two.

Harry watched his girlfriend blatantly ignore Sirius. "What's going on, Sirius? Hermione looked downright pissed at you."

Sirius squirmed a bit. "I may have told her about Dumbledore's orders to restrict contact with you."

Harry looked wide-eyed at his godfather. "Did you agree with them?"

The Marauder shook his head. "Once I heard about them, I didn't have time to object before I realized someone had to tell Hermione. I did that and, well, I'm a bit scared to talk to her now."

"So you in no way participated in any attempt to limit contact between Hermione and myself?" Harry asked, seeking clarification.

"As soon as I got back from telling her, Remus and I talked it over and confronted Dumbledore. A half hour later, he was off picking you up."

Harry gave his godfather a smile. "I'll take care of it."

Marching up the stairs, Harry looked through the open rooms to find where Hermione was staying. The giant poster of himself on the wall surrounded by various knick knacks that he had given his girlfriend over the years told him he had found the correct room. With a bemused smile, Harry shook his head in slight exasperation. If it were any other girl, he might have thought she had made a shrine to him but she was Hermione and she already had all of him. She had no need for a shrine.

"So, Sirius tells me you said a few things to him earlier," Harry said to his girlfriend as she moped on the bed.

Crawling off the bed, Hermione found her way into his arms. She sullenly nodded into his chest.

"So what did he do that made you treat him like you do those girls you call 'skanky bitches?' "

Harry barely heard her reply. "He told me I wasn't to try to contact you."

"Is that what he actually said or did he tell you that Professor Dumbledore had decided that?"

Almost petulantly, Hermione muttered, "The latter."

"Did you let Sirius tell you that he disagreed with the headmaster but wanted you to know as soon as the order was handed out?" Hermione reluctantly shook her head. "Then you know what you need to do." Hermione nodded.

Harry let out a relieved sigh. He knew Hermione could go overboard from time to time. He did his best to try and keep her from going overboard on people who didn't deserve it. He didn't always succeed but he did try.

"We've talked about this before, Hermione. You can't just lash out at just anyone. This is why we have our agreement. Now, since you didn't actually do anything other than threaten Sirius, a genuine apology will suffice. Just remember to lay the blame on the right people. For example, in this case, Professor Dumbledore is the one that gave the order, not Sirius."

Harry froze as he realized what he had just said.

Hermione perked up, brightly smiling at him while Harry just rolled his eyes, praying to whatever deity who would listen. All he asked for was for the world to survive what she was about to unleash on the headmaster.

* * *

 _ **Once again, please pass along any ideas you might have for the Adorably Violent Hermione to me via review or PM.**_


	18. Chapter 18

_**More Luna as requested. A hint of things past and things to come.**_

* * *

 **January 1996**

Luna had decided that having friends was a wonderful thing. When she was younger, she used to play with Ginny Weasley all the time given that the Burrow was located a short distance from the Rookery. Then the accident had happened. Luna was watching her mother work when an experimental spell had gone horribly wrong. Pandora Lovegood had spent her last moments trying to comfort her daughter, doing everything she could to convey just how much she loved her daughter and reassure her that everything would be okay.

After that, Luna's father, Xenophilius, had condemned Luna to a life that was little different from house arrest. She was no longer permitted to walk to the Burrow to play with Ginny. Ginny was no longer allowed to come over as Molly Weasley would insist on coming with. Xenophilius worked from home and had always taken time to watch over the girls before. Apparently, with Pandora's death, Mrs Weasley felt he was suddenly incapable of doing what he had done for the better part of the nine years following Luna's birth.

For the next two years, Luna had lived a very lonely life. Almost all of her time had been spent with her father or wandering around the small parcel of land they owned that surrounded the Rookery. She helped her father with _The Quibbler_ , writing bits that he would even sometimes publish. She even went on trips with him as he investigated claims of new magical animals being sighted. Contrary to popular belief, Xenophilius did not make up the animals he reported about in his publication. Some had rumours of their existence going back over five thousand years.

One thing her father had always done, however, was prohibit her from writing about the Minister for Magic, the Ministry of Magic, and the employees of the Ministry. Any time that she wrote about them, nothing she could do would ever get him to publish her work. As a result, she spent all of her time on the mysterious animals as opposed to general news pieces.

Luna had just finished sending off a letter to her father containing her latest thoughts about his newest article in their series on the Nargle. As the owl flitted away, Luna reached up and played with her Dirigible Plum shaped earrings. Most thought they were radishes. After a conversation with Harry and Hermione, Luna admitted she could understand the confusion. She didn't wear them as much as she used to but, whenever she was feeling the loss of her mother, it was impossible to separate them from her. They were one of the last gifts her mother had ever given her.

Harry and Hermione understood, Harry more so than Hermione. When he had presented Luna with a small pair of diamond stud earrings as a present, for no particular reason other than he was her friend, Luna had nearly panicked. When the story of her earrings' origin had come out, Harry had simply gaven her a hug.

"I never knew my mother, Luna. The only thing I have from either of my parents is my dad's old cloak and a map he and his friends made while they were here," he said. "If you never wear my gift, that's fine. I just wanted you to have a choice."

Luna remembered asking, "So I don't have to pick between these and my mummy's?" She had felt so small asking that.

"You can choose everyday which you want to wear. You don't have to wear one or the other for the rest of your life."

Luna's father was many things but truly understanding of what it was like to be a young witch was not one of them. He had never thought she might want a choice of jewelry. Harry had given her that choice with his gift. It was a novel concept for Luna, having gone without such a thing for so long.

Following that day, Luna had worn Harry's present nearly every day. Seeing the smile on Harry's face when he saw her wearing them removed any ache from her heart at not wearing her mother's gift. The rare days that she still wore the Dirigible Plum-shaped ones had him wrapping her up in a warm, almost loving embrace until she stopped shaking for fear he would be upset when he saw her not wearing his present.

Luna wasn't sure what to call Harry. He was more to her than what she pictured a brother might be but he was obviously in love with Hermione. He never kissed Luna but was very free with giving hugs.

Hermione was different from Harry. She was less flexible in her treatment of Luna, having set aside a very strict allotment of time to spend with the Ravenclaw. However, during that time, the two witches could talk about anything. Luna mostly stuck to academic topics but occasionally they simply gossipped about whatever what going on around the castle. Luna had learned quickly to avoid talking about Harry as either Hermione would become incredibly defensive and territorial or she would get a dazed, dreamy look that would put a young Ginny Weasley playing "The Boy-Who-Lived's Wife" to shame.

Whenever Luna approached Hermione outside of the allotted block of time, Hermione always played a game. She would cast colourful jets of magic towards Luna, and Luna would dodge them. By strange coincidence, every time Hermione did this, there was some Ravenclaw girl standing behind Luna that would get hit by the light show and have some sort of accident. It really was very silly. Luna knew Hermione would never hurt a friend so whatever happened to the other girls was simply because they were clumsy. It was certainly not Hermione's fault like the girls would later whisper.

Finishing her musing about the past few months, Luna looked up to see Hedwig winging towards the Owlery. Luna smiled. Hedwig was always good for a conversation whenever Harry and Hermione were unavailable.

"Hello, Hedwig," Luna greeting when the snowy owl finally landed on her perch. "How are you today, girl?"

Hedwig barked in reply.

Luna nodded. "That's good. Is the letter for me or did you just come up here to see me?" Luna asked, seeing a letter tied to Hedwig's leg.

Hedwig barked once more.

"Ah, well I'm very glad to see you too." Luna reached up to stroke Hedwig's feathers. "Would you like me to take the letter to Harry on your behalf?"

Hedwig nuzzled into Luna's hand. Luna giggled at how demanding Hedwig was.

"Oh very well, when I'm done petting you then."

Five minutes later, Luna had untied the letter and began to wander down to find Harry and Hermione. As Luna was headed towards the Library, her best bet for finding the two given the time of day, Luna noticed an unusual floral smell wafting up from the letter. Examining the letter in her hand, Luna noticed the distinctly feminine handwriting.

She debated opening the letter. Hermione wouldn't have hesitated. Harry would give an exasperated sigh if she had before indulgently waving away his irritation at her but Luna was not Hermione. Harry tolerated a lot of Luna's oddities. He even let her climb up into his lap one time on the anniversary of her mother's death. Harry was revealed to be a fantastic cuddler on that occasion. However, Luna had never before tried to invade his privacy quite like opening his letter would.

Frowning, Luna opted to respect Harry's privacy and not open the letter.

Slipping past Madam Pince, Luna found Harry and Hermione in the back of the library. Hermione had been shocked the first time Luna had found them there, muttering something about faulty attention aversion charms, but Harry had seemed happy to see the younger Ravenclaw.

"Harry, Hedwig just delivered a letter for you," Luna offered, not waiting for acknowledgement.

Hermione frowned from her place in Harry's lap, reaching out to snatch the letter from Luna's hands. Harry poked his girlfriend in the side, causing her to retract her hand. Harry offered Luna a brilliant smile.

"Thank you, Luna." Harry extended his own hand. Luna carefully placed the letter in his grasp before standing there, waiting for something interesting to happen. Interesting things always happened around Harry.

Harry gently urged Hermione from his lap. Petulantly, Hermione moved to the chair across from him, straightening her robes in the process. Luna idly wondered why Hermione seemed to always need to straighten her robes or her skirt or her blouse or some other article of clothing.

Both girls waited as Harry read the floral scented letter. After nearly a minute, Harry flipped to a second page, overlooking the extended hand of his girlfriend. Hermione pouted at not being offered the letter to read for herself.

Harry hummed as he finished the second page and made his way to the third. A content smile bloomed on his face as he read the contents of the third page. Finally, Harry reordered the pages, folded up the letter, and placed it in a pocket on the inside of his robes. Hermione looked downright angry at his actions but held her tongue. Luna vaguely recalled something about only Harry being able to put things in or take things out of that particular pocket.

"That was interesting." Harry casually stated as he reached out for Hermione's hand. Luna blinked, missing Hermione's near instant movement from chair to lap. Rather than dwell on how Hermione seemed to be able to Apparate from anywhere to Harry's lap, Luna turned her attention back to Harry.

"Do you mind if I ask who wrote you?"

Giving Luna an indulgent smile, Harry answered, "Of course not, Luna. It was a letter from Gabrielle Delacour, the little girl I rescued in addition to Hermione from the lake last year. She has a bit of hero worship going on and writes me from time to time. She really is a sweet girl. According to Fleur, she looks up to me now almost as much as Fleur."

Hermione pulled back, giving Harry a suspicious glare. "How do you know what Fleur thinks?"

Chagrined, Harry looked at his girlfriend. "Fleur said so in her letter."

"And just what else did the trollop say in _her_ letter." Even Luna could hear the emphasis Hermione put in her speech. Apparently, she was quite irritated that Harry hadn't offered that little detail.

"Nothing much," Harry murmured. "She just said she would be in Hogsmeade on business this weekend and was wondering if I would be available to get caught up over lunch."

Both Luna and Hermione glared at Harry. Luna loved Hogsmeade weekends. She got to spend all day walking around with Harry and Hermione, her two favourite people in the world after her mother and father. Having to share Harry's attention with Hermione was fine. Having to share Harry's attention with anyone else was not very much fun. Luna also knew that she was much more tolerant of sharing Harry's attention than Hermione was.

"What do you plan on doing about this?" Hermione growled out.

Harry looked sheepish. "She said Gabrielle would be here, too."

It was Luna's turn to frown. Luna did not like how Gabrielle was treated so similarly to herself. Harry had sent the young french girl little gifts over the months. The one time before, when Fleur and Gabrielle were in Hogsmeade, Gabrielle had curled up against Harry, not in his lap but against his side.

What made it worse was that Gabrielle was impossible not to like. She was bright, cheery, happy, and just wholly adorable. When Harry and Fleur were talking about her work at Gringotts in Diagon Alley, Gabrielle had dragged Luna by the hand to play with her. Unlike Ginny, Gabrielle didn't want to play "The Boy-Who-Lived's Wife", she wanted to just play with the dolls she had brought, and talk about princesses and knights and unicorns.

When Luna managed to bring her thoughts back to the situation at hand, Harry was gone and Hermione was sulking in his vacated chair. When Hermione noticed Luna's attention was back in the present, the Gryffindor looked at the Ravenclaw.

Hermione growled, "I'm getting tired of this skanky French bitch trying to get her claws into _my_ Harry. We have two days before she gets here." Luna nodded.

"Can we leave Gabrielle out of it?" Luna asked meekly. There were things that Luna didn't like about Gabrielle but she genuinely liked the little girl. Besides, Fleur was the one trying to steal Harry away. Gabrielle just wanted to play with her hero.

Hermione gave the matter a great deal of thought before nodding.

"Fine, but it's time, once and for all, for _Mademoiselle Delacour_ to learn to stay away from _my_ Harry."

Luna watched as Hermione stormed off. Sighing, grateful that Gabrielle would avoid being pulled into the ongoing war between Fleur and Hermione, Luna moved to follow.

It was time to eat and there was pudding waiting for her. There always was. Dobby was such a considerate House-elf.

* * *

 _ **Setup for the mother of all confrontations between Hermione and Fleur.**_


	19. Chapter 19

_**Another direct follow up. Our last visit to Fifth Year for a while.**_

* * *

 **January 1996**

"Gabrielle, are you ready to go?"

Gabrielle, nine year old younger sister of Fleur Isabelle Delacour, jumped to her feet. Fleur was headed to Hogsmeade and had made plans for the two sisters to have lunch with Harry. Gabrielle was more excited than she had been in months. Ever since he had pulled her from the lake during that tournament, she had looked up to him as some great hero.

Frowning, Gabrielle thought back to that nasty February afternoon. She had been told it would be fun and help her big sister. Waking up cold, wet, and generally miserable was not fun. Seeing how scared Fleur had been was also not fun. Gabrielle finding out Harry Potter had rescued her when it appeared no one would come for her wasn't fun.

It was amazing!

"Gabrielle!" Fleur called out.

"Coming!" The younger Delacour daughter grabbed the doll Harry had given her and rushed down the hall to where Fleur was waiting by the Floo. Looking at her older sister, Gabrielle noted that Fleur had taken extra time to look nice. "'Arry's going to be zere, _non_?"

Fleur nodded. "Yes, 'e is. Now let's go." She prodded Gabrielle towards the Floo. Taking a small pinch of Floo Powder, Gabrielle stepped into the Floo. Being careful to properly enunciate - the British Floo System was very particular about pronunciation - Gabrielle called out their destination.

"The Three Broomsticks!"

Keeping her eyes closed tight, Gabrielle felt the world around her rush by. When she finally came to a stop, she was standing in a lively pub surrounded by dozens of Hogwarts students. Looking around, she noticed a tall boy with messy black hair and brilliant green eyes.

"'Arry!" Gabrielle cried out. She rushed over and tackled his legs in the fiercest hug she could manage.

It was only the second time since the tournament that she had seen Harry. The only other time was a brief lunch a few months back when Fleur had something else to take care of in Hogsmeade. Gabrielle had thought it odd since they talked with Harry for a while only to head back to Fleur's flat when Harry had to head back to the castle. When Gabrielle asked her older sister about whatever she had needed to take care of, Fleur had waved off her concern.

Rather than dwell on how weird her sister was, Gabrielle was simply happy to see Harry. Since he had pulled her from the lake bottom, Gabrielle had tried to stick to Harry like glue. Every chance she could, she talked to him, had him play with her dolls with her, had him read books in English to her, generally any excuse she could think up to spend time with her hero. Harry was always fun to spend time with. Before long, she started thinking of him like she did Fleur, an older sibling.

On her birthday, Harry had given her a doll with silvery hair and blue eyes in a pretty white dress. It was the most beautiful doll she had ever seen. She was almost afraid to touch it for fear of damaging it. He had told her it would mend itself if something happened to it and clean itself if it got dirty. When she had asked who it was supposed to be, Harry just gave her a little wink and poked her in the forehead. That had secured it. From that point on, Harry was officially her older brother. When Fleur teased Gabrielle saying that her words meant Harry had to marry the older French witch, Gabrielle had glared at her sister.

"'Arry is my frère! You are my sœur! Ew!"

Fleur had not looked happy at that. Harry and his brunette friend had looked relieved.

Since then, Fleur had tried to get Gabrielle to agree that him being her older brother meant he had to marry Fleur. It finally got so bad that Gabrielle just stuck her tongue out at Fleur whenever it was brought up.

When Gabrielle had to leave to go back to France after Harry had beat Fleur in the tournament, Harry and Hermione had both given her hugs. They even told her she could write to them and Harry's beautiful Snowy Owl Hedwig would come get the letter. When Gabrielle had asked how, Harry winked.

"She's just that special an owl."

Gabrielle remembered having doubts but, when she finished her first letter that summer, his gorgeous owl showed up on her windowsill. Fleur, as bossy as she could be, had insisted on being able to send a letter as well. At first, Hedwig had resisted. However, when Gabrielle finally caved to her older sister's pressure and turned her big blue eyes towards the owl to plead, Hedwig finally gave in.

It was months before Gabrielle had gotten to see Harry again. She had written to him, trying to get him to come play with her in France and maybe even ride horses with her, but he had never been able to make it. She had even said he could bring Hermione, too. He had told her how sweet it was to offer but, as much as he would have liked to see her, they couldn't make it that summer.

After several more letters, Gabrielle had learned when he would be in Hogsmeade. Ecstatic, she had shared the news with Fleur. That same day, Fleur had suddenly had business that weekend in Hogsmeade that simply could not wait and would be happy to escort her sister. Gabrielle had written Harry to tell him right away. Harry and Hermione had been very happy to see her and gave her lots of very nice hugs. Hermione had even given her another doll, this one with dirty blonde hair and silvery eyes.

That first visit to Hogsmeade was also the day she met Luna. Luna was lots of fun to play with. She had a very good imagination. Luna was the one that came up with the current storyline that Gabrielle's dolls were still living through months later. Between the two of them, they had even convinced Harry to play with them. That was when Gabrielle and Luna learned Harry had a very funny voice when he tried to speak like a girl.

Looking up at Harry's face, Gabrielle noticed he looked a bit more tired than the last time she had seen him. Before she could ask him about if he was getting enough sleep, she saw Luna and Hermione at his sides. Quickly letting go of Harry, Gabrielle proceeded to give Hermione an extra special hug for sharing her Harry time with Gabrielle. She then grabbed Luna by the hand and began explaining everything that had happened in the dolls' lives since they had last been together.

When Gabrielle heard Harry chuckling and Hermione and Fleur giggling behind her, she promptly stuck her tongue out at the three older magicals.

The group of five had enjoyed a leisurely lunch. Harry had teased Gabrielle about how quickly she was growing up and how she was now almost as pretty as Luna. When Luna asked how pretty she was, Harry told her that she was almost as pretty as Hermione and Fleur. Harry had jumped like he'd been kicked, wearing a very sheepish smile at the glare Hermione was giving him.

"Hem, hem," a voice interrupted the quiet lecture Hermione was giving Harry.

Gabrielle looked up. "'Arry? Who is ze _dame crapaud rose?"_

Harry quickly looked to Hermione and Fleur. "Pink toad lady," Hermione whispered, just loud enough for Gabrielle, currently tucked into Harry's side, to hear. Harry snorted.

Turning back to Gabrielle, Harry said, "She is Professor Umbridge. She teaches in the castle." Properly informed now, Gabrielle nodded.

"Hem, hem," Umbridge intoned again.

With a sigh that Gabrielle felt must have been exaggerated, Harry looked to his professor. "Yes, Professor Umbridge?"

"What do you think you are doing here, Mr Potter?"

Harry looked befuddled. "I'm enjoying lunch with my friends and girlfriend."

The Pink Toad Lady looked smug. "I'm referring to being here in Hogsmeade at all. I believe I prohibited you from participating in Hogsmeade Weekends after your behaviour in class two weeks ago."

"Ah." Harry said as if he finally understood something critical. "That. I appealed your decision to Professor McGonagall. She very quickly informed me that, as I have a signed form and my behaviour in class was me shouting at you, at your request, she would overturn the punishment. She was very pale when she did so, almost as if some travesty had almost occurred. Hermione was there with me. She witnessed everything."

Gabrielle could have sworn the Pink Toad Lady's face twisted in anger for a brief moment before regaining its saccharine smile. "And what about these two you're having lunch with? I don't recall them having permission to be in Hogsmeade this weekend."

Everyone at the table looked at one another awkwardly. "Professor," Harry finally offered after the awkward pause, "these are Fleur and Gabrielle Delacour. They aren't students at Hogwarts."

"I know that!" the Ugly Pink Toad Lady snapped. "I was referring to the fact that these _creatures_ and the daughter of that idiotic conspiracy nut are mixing with proper British Wizards and Witches like they belong here."

The mood at the table suddenly turned to ice. Harry dropped his head into his hands and moaned, "Bloody hell." Quickly looking up at Gabrielle, he added, "Don't repeat that."

Gabrielle nodded. Harry had asked her something. Of course she would do it for him.

Turning her attention back to the Really Ugly Pink Toad Lady, Gabrielle noticed her older sister almost transforming. There were wisps of flame surrounding her hands. Hermione had already pulled her wand and some spell was halfway to the rude professor.

Hermione looked at Harry with pleading eyes. Harry sighed.

"This once, Hermione, just this once," Harry started. He gave her a firm look. "Just this one time you can ignore any limitations from our agreement except the lethal action clauses."

Hermione pouted at him. "But you heard what she said about Gabrielle and Luna."

"I know," Harry replied but didn't offer anything further.

Gabrielle was confused. Before she could ask about what was going on, Fleur interrupted. "What are you two talking about?"

Harry looked to the older French witch. "Hermione and I have an agreement between us. We are awfully protective of each other. However, Hermione is usually the one that ends up taking action," he said, sending a bemused glare at his girlfriend, "usually because she doesn't give me a chance to. That reminds me, I still need to have words with Krum over the Yule Ball from last year."

Hermione jumped in. "I don't like sharing Harry. You know this, Fleur. You've seen _some_ of what I can do." Gabrielle took note of the emphasis Hermione added. "Harry has made me be more open minded about people, convinced me that not everyone is a threat to him or us. Your sister is one such example." Hermione looked at Gabrielle fondly. "Harry and I both adore her. She's simply impossible not to like. It's thanks to Harry making me tolerate her at first that opened the door for us to befriend Luna this year."

Harry continued where Hermione left off. "We've had problems all year with Professor Umbridge. I've tried to be cordial and tolerate everything she's said to and about me. Hermione has wanted to teach her a lesson. It took us five months to get enough information for me to definitively say that this woman," he gestured towards the Really Really Ugly Pink Toad Lady whose face was frozen in a hideous expression of fury, "is one of the most most disgusting beings I've ever had the displeasure of meeting. If she had her way, you and Gabrielle would be deported at best, slaughtered and harvested for magical components at worst." Gabrielle saw Harry give her a wary eye. "And maybe things even worse than that."

Whatever Harry had just implied had enraged Fleur. Gabrielle had never seen her sister so angry. Gabrielle burrowed into Harry's side, worried what Fleur might do. Harry wrapped an arm around Gabrielle, which did quite a bit to reassure her.

"Oh really?" Fleur asked. She turned to Hermione. "We may have our differences but I must insist you allow me to help you deal with this, this," Fleur gestured towards the still frozen professor, " _creature_."

Gabrielle saw Hermione nod. She and Fleur rose, guiding the frozen witch away at wand point. Just before the two were out of earshot, Gabrielle hear Hermione speak to Fleur. "This changes nothing. Harry is mine. I am his. You mess with us at your own peril."

"Any woman has ze right to try for a man such as 'Arry," Fleur responded.

"At least, you know a good man when you see one," Hermione commented as they exited the front of the pub. Gabrielle noticed that, for some reason, no one else paid the two any mind. Even the boys weren't looking at Fleur like they always did.

Turning towards Luna, Gabrielle noticed Harry had wrapped an arm around her as well. Deciding the mood was too tense, she changed the topic of conversation. "I like your earrings, Luna. Where did you get zem?"

Luna picked up on the new topic. With a bright smile, she answered, "Harry and Hermione gave them to me. The only other pair I have my mother gave me before she died."

Gabrielle looked up at Harry with a pout. He chuckled at her. "I got in enough trouble with Hermione for suggesting getting them for Luna. It was the first time in four years I got cut off from cuddles instead of her." Harry shuddered. "It was a dark time. A _very_ dark time."

The pout grew. "Can you ask her now?"

"Ask me what?" Hermione interrupted. She and Fleur had returned.

Nervously, Harry turned to his girlfriend. "Hey, Hermione, Fleur. Done already?"

Hermione narrowed her eyes at him. "Not yet. Now, what were you going to ask me?"

"If he could buy me a pair of earrings like Luna's," Gabrielle offered helpfully.

Hermione turned to Harry, her face rapidly darkening. "Harry . . ."

Harry quailed, jumping up and running towards the door. "But I didn't do anything!" he cried out.

Hermione, followed by Luna, then Gabrielle, then Fleur, chased after him.

When Gabrielle made it to the door, Harry was already two buildings down. Hermione was yelling after him. "Stop buying presents for other girls!"

Harry was too busy dodging spells to reply.

Luna looked back to Gabrielle with a small smile. "I thought Hermione only played this game with me. It's so much fun. It's nice to see her playing it with others."

Gabrielle just giggled as she chased after them, jumping over some unconscious boy with blond hair and green trimmed robes. Harry was always so much fun to spend time with.

* * *

 _ **The pairing will not be anything other than Harry/Hermione. Please submit any ideas via review or PM.**_


	20. Chapter 20

_**Just a quick one today.**_

* * *

 **September 1993**

Being a Dementor was a very boring affair. Being a Dementor in the modern magical world was beyond wearisome. The current British Ministry of Magic forced them to float around a cold and dreary island. They had to listen to the pathetic wails and moans of countless prisoners day in, day out. Humans were such pathetically weak willed creatures.

A few months before, one of those prisoners had escaped. It was the first time that any Dementor could recall that a man had slipped past their guard. The stupid humans on the island had no idea that implied hundreds of years, even at a conservative estimate. When the dog-man had escaped, the British Ministry of Magic had, in their infinite stupidity, let the Dementors free to roam after the convict.

It was a delicious experience. The humans on the island were all filled with despair or simply insane. Those full of despair felt no happiness, lamenting its loss, meaning their existence tasted like ash. The insane experienced a hollow happiness at best, meaning their existence tasted like air.

The dog-man had been different. He was filled with anguish, but not despair. His existence tasted like ambrosia compared to all of the other prisoners. However, when the dog-man went from being a man to being a dog, the Dementors could no longer taste him. It was a very frustrating decade, filled with brief moments of ecstasy followed by long periods of disappointment stemming from being denied.

Being free to hunt the dog-man was paradise for the Dementors. They were surrounded by humans that felt real happiness. Happy humans had a particularly delicious existence to simply be around. No tasting was actually necessary, which was a good thing considering the blasted Ministry of Magic might force the Dementors back to the island if they partook.

Several dementors were floating above a massive city, London if they recalled correctly. It looked very different from the London the Dementors remembered. Steaming north from the city was a scarlet train, spewing steam and smoke, happiness radiating from it like a beacon. Reaching an accord, the Dementors decided to pursue the particularly delicious prey.

The train was quick, so it took the Dementors hours to catch up to it, flying straight while the train had to curve back and forth across the landscape. Along the way, several other Dementors joined them in their quest to taste the deliciousness. Finally, a bit beyond where that first big stone wall was built, they caught up to the puffing pile of metal, fire and smoke.

Two Dementors promptly went to the front to cool the fires and stop the prey from escaping. The remaining dozens swarmed down to the numerous tasty morsels waiting for them. One Dementor picked up on a particularly interesting taste, a young human, full of happiness. But, the taste contained a unique twist, almost familiar, as if the human was well acquainted with ends.

Getting the attention of one of its fellows, the Dementor stalked towards the taste. The taste grew stronger and more delicious every bit closer the Dementors grew. The taste drowned out all of the ones around it. Most Dementors would be happy with any of the other tastes, but this one was a particularly old Dementor, a connoisseur. It had tasted many existences and sampled many flavours. What was waiting beyond the door was something wholly new.

Reaching out with its grey, scabbed hand, glistening with a slimy film, the Dementor opened the door. Just as it was about to enter, it sensed something very wrong.

The unique taste was not alone. There were other humans with it. One tasted similar to the dog-man. A second tasted of sleeping courage, still buried under a mountain of cowardice. The last, however, stopped the Dementor in its path.

"And just _what_ do you think you're doing?" the voice from the last called out.

The Dementor shrieked, trying to back up as fast as possible. It had heard of this human. If this human was here, all of the Dementors were in danger. Scrambling back, shoving the other, younger Dementors out of the compartment, the old Dementor shrieked out to every Dementor that could hear it.

"You interrupted my Harry time," the voice called out. "I think I should demand restitution."

There was a coldness to the human's voice that even the Dementors felt.

"Hermione, just tell them leave us alone," the unique taste spoke. "My lap is getting cold."

"But Harry," the scary voice whined. "Oh, fine."

Shrieking one last time, the old Dementor fled from the train. It may not like the way the Ministry of Magic restricted them but it was a far better existence that facing that human girl again.

Even Dementors knew to stay away if she was enough to scare a thousand year old basilisk. The old Dementor would make sure that the foolish young ones took the postings near the witch. It would stay as far away as possible.

Seniority did have its privileges.

* * *

 _ **Pass along any ideas via review or PM.**_


	21. Chapter 21

_**Thanks pfanna for the excuse to mess with Snape.**_

* * *

 **November 1991**

Neville Longbottom did not like Hermione Granger. That was not to say he disliked her, rather he felt she was abrasive and, as such, he did not like to spend time around her. His roommate, Harry Potter, on the other hand, seemed to enjoy her company. He had scarcely been without her for the week since Halloween.

Neville was not a confident boy. He was well aware of his shy tendencies thanks to his grandmother, Augusta Longbottom. She regularly called him out on his shyness. It was her way of trying to correct what she saw as a defect of his character. Considering she never let him out of her sight, Neville wasn't sure how he was supposed to bloom like the flowers in their greenhouses. Even flowers needed more than food and water. It also needed warmth and sunshine. It took all three for a healthy plant. Expecting Neville to become even a shadow of his parents having a completely different childhood with different experiences seemed borderline stupid to Neville, not that he would dare say such a thing to his grandmother.

Watching Harry for the past week had been interesting to Neville. It was as if Harry had suffered like plants in a harsh environment only to be suddenly exposed to a plentiful supply of food, water and sunlight. A strong plant was actually one that had suffered through harsher times. It developed stronger root systems, stems, and an overall heartier self after surviving trying circumstances. Harry was now a strong plant that was positively blooming. After less than a week of Hermione taking a noted interest in him, Harry's grades were already improving, he was happier, and Neville could swear the Boy-Who-Lived was taller. It seemed as if he was rapidly becoming the boy everyone had read about in the books rather than the meek one everyone had first encountered two months back.

Moving his eyes to the pair, Neville noticed Hermione pointing something out in _Quidditch through the Ages_ to Harry. She had checked the book out from the Library before their first broom riding lesson, hoping for some bit of helpful information. It lacked in that but contained other interesting trivia. Even growing up loving Quidditch and attending games with his grandmother – she was an avid Appleby Arrows supporter, passing along her love of the team to Neville – he learned new things about his favourite team thanks to the book.

When Harry's first Quidditch game approached, Hermione had loaned him the book. Neville assumed that at some point she must have made him check it out under his own name considering how long the two had possessed it. Neville was watching the two when a dark figure approached them. His heart began to race, his palms became sweaty, he grew short of breath.

Professor Snape.

The man was positively a menace. Neville wasn't sure who the professor hated more, himself or Harry. Whenever either Gryffindor was in his presence, Professor Snape seemed ready to hex the offending party into oblivion.

Curling in on himself, Neville almost missed the exchange between Professor Snape, Harry, and Hermione.

"What's that you've got there, Potter?" the professor sneered.

Harry held up the book.

"Library books are not to be taken outside the school. Give it to me."

Neville heard him take a few points but pulled away, out of sight as the man turned to return to the castle. As he walked past, Neville noticed Professor Snape was limping slightly. When the current bane of Neville's existence was past, he emerged from hiding to find Harry and Hermione were gone as well.

It took him until dinner to find the pair. Neville had just sat down when they entered the Great Hall. Harry was slightly pink in the face while Hermione had her arm through his. Both seemed to be in good spirits. Neville waited until they were seated across from him before deciding to take advantage of an opportunity.

"Hey Harry, Hermione. Do you think I might study with you from time to time? I'm not doing so well at anything except Herbology and Gran is really getting after me in her letters."

Harry looked at Hermione, apparently leaving the decision in her hands. Neville cringed at seeing the irritation on her face at his question.

After several tense moments of silence, Harry poked Hermione in the side, causing her to squirm slightly.

"Oh fine," Hermione said. "You can find us any day between four and five in the Library."

Neville heard Harry whisper to Hermione, "Why then? We're normally there from three to six."

Hermione simply gave Harry a pointed glare. Harry dropped the line of questioning.

Picking up his flagging courage, Neville thanked them. "Thanks. I just don't know what I'd do if I disappointed Gran after actually getting an invitation to go to school here."

Harry turned towards Neville. "What do you mean?"

Before Neville could reply, not that he really wanted to tell the pair about how his family had thought he was a squib until his uncle dropped him out of a third story window, the doors to the Great Hall slammed open.

In tottered Professor Snape.

When Neville thought tottered, he meant a tottered limping. The man now had goat legs, complete with cloven hooves, coming out from under a kilt. Whatever had changed his legs had not healed them as one was still wounded. He even had small horns growing from his head.

"I wonder where his tail and pitchfork are," Neville heard Harry mutter.

Harry wasn't the only one muttering. The entire Great Hall was filled with a dull roar of combined murmurs.

"I suppose that's what happens when you steal a library book," Hermione responded to Harry. Taking one look at Hermione, Neville knew she had something to do with what had transpired from the smug expression on her face.

Neville decided right then and there that Hermione was definitely someone to learn from, at least if he could avoid upsetting her.

* * *

 _ **Twenty-one days. Twenty-one chapters. Thank you to everyone for your support.**_


	22. Chapter 22

_**Countless thanks to Pax Humana for his tireless beta work.**_

* * *

 **June 1993**

Three days had passed since Harry had faced down a basilisk. Three days since he had been poisoned by that basilisk. Three days since he had been saved by phoenix tears. Three days since he had lugged an unconscious Ginny Weasley back up the pipe. Three days since his confrontation with Lucius Malfoy. Three days since he had freed Dobby from servitude. Two days since Hermione Granger had laid into him.

He would have almost preferred to face the basilisk again.

Hermione had pointed out several mistakes he had made once she finally gave him enough time to explain what had transpired down in the Chamber of Secrets. He should have taken a faculty member with him or had one go in his place. He should have transfigured a rooster or had someone do so for him. He forgot to take anything like a mirror to help him look around corners. In hindsight, his glasses should have prevented him from meeting the basilisk's gaze directly but his lack of forethought had earned him another tirade.

Once Harry was healed to Hermione's satisfaction and she had calmed down from the announcement that year end exams would be cancelled – absolutely idiotic in her mind since fifth and seventh years had to take them regardless due to OWLs and NEWTs being required at the end of those years – she had laid a kiss on Harry. It was not the gentle pecks on the cheeks that she had previously gifted him with. Nor was it one of the oh so brief touches of her lips on his. Hermione had latched onto Harry and refused to separate their lips for almost five minutes.

Harry had no idea how long it had taken his brain to restart after that but, in his mind, it was worth a shovel speech from her father to experience the bliss that was a real kiss from Hermione.

 _It might even be worth her father carrying out his threats for another kiss like that._

Hermione had spent the two days either glued to Harry's side or with her nose firmly planted in stacks and stacks of books. Harry thought she might have retrieved several from the restricted section using his father's invisibility cloak but had no hard evidence to support his theory. Whenever he asked what she was doing with her time, she would simply snuggle up a little closer and his brain would freeze again.

Harry had decided he liked having an affectionate older girlfriend.

Harry checked his watch. It was well past when he and Hermione normally made their way down to breakfast. Normally, he would assume she was lost in a book somewhere but she had promised to meet him for breakfast. When she promised something, it took a thousand year old basilisk petrifying her, or something equally dire, to make her break said promise.

Neville had gone on to breakfast a half hour before. He was pleasant enough company that Harry even called him a friend. When Neville had first approached Harry and Hermione back after Halloween the year before, Harry didn't quite know what to make of him. They had slept in the same room for over two months but Neville's painfully shy nature meant he almost never spoke to anyone unless they spoke to him first. After a few months, Harry had talked to Hermione about spending a bit more time with Neville, wanting a male friend in addition to her.

It had taken two weeks of back and forth before Hermione granted a trial period. After a month of keeping his grades up while spending time with Neville, ignoring Ron Weasley who always seemed to be tagging along, Hermione had let up her scrutiny. She had tearfully confessed her real fear, that she was worried Harry would outgrow her and replace her with Neville. That was the first occasion where Hermione had crawled into Harry's lap. He was still smaller than her back then so it took some rearranging every time for both to get comfortable but Harry enjoyed the closeness.

"Did Neville already go on to breakfast?"

Harry looked up at hearing Hermione's voice. He nodded in response to her question. "Ron was making such a fuss that Neville went down with him so you and I could have a bit of time without the prat going on about the whole Chamber of Secrets thing."

Hermione snorted. "With the way he goes on, you'd think he went down there with you."

Both second years shook their heads at their housemate's antics. Harry extended his arm to Hermione. She stepped up, smiling as she took his arm with hers.

"So what kept you? I was expecting you almost an hour ago."

Hermione blushed. "I didn't mean to take so long. I had to take care of something."

It was her tone that alerted Harry that something was wrong. " 'Take care of something?' What do you mean by that?"

Hermione buried her face into Harry's shoulder. When she didn't answer, Harry tried again.

"Hermione," Harry's voice took on a stern tone. "What did you mean by that?"

"Ginny Weasley was going on about how you saved her just like a fairy tale princess and how it meant you two belonged together."

Harry stopped walking.

"Ginny Weasley? I barely know the girl. She kept running away and squeaking whenever I was around. She's been doing that for the entire school year. I've said 'Hi' in passing a few times," Harry pointedly ignored Hermione's growl, "but nothing more than that. Even down in the chamber the only thing I did was grunt at her, considering she was intentionally making me carry her."

Looking down, Harry saw a smirk on Hermione's face. "What did you do, Hermione?"

"Let's just say her hair is going to look pale by comparison and she'd be better off trying to talk to mice and rats than people."

Confused, Harry continued towards the Great Hall for their a breakfast. He and Hermione had just about finished cleaning off their plates – Hermione made him eat much healthier than he used to and it was proving to do him good – when a young girl in Gryffindor colors entered.

Her face was a red so bright that everyone had to shield their eyes. Harry saw several professors casting charms to try and dim the radiance coming from the girl's face. They all failed miserably.

*squeak*!

"What in the world, Miss Weasley? Do you need to go see Madam Pomfrey?" their Head of House and Deputy Headmistress asked.

*squeak* *squeak* *squeeeeeak*

Harry took one look at Hermione before returning his attention to the scraps of food in front of him, fighting off a smile. "More of the same, I suppose."

* * *

 _ **The beginning for Ginny.**_


	23. Chapter 23

_**Shorter, but fun. Hope you all enjoy.**_

* * *

 **June 1994**

Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew and Severus Snape were all sweating profusely. The night had been filled with chaos, confusion, and general insanity but all four grown men were wishing a bit of that pandemonium would return. Instead, they were sitting, stuck to four desks in an abandoned classroom on the fourth floor of the north wing of Hogwarts.

Sirius Black's fearful appearance had replaced his half mad look from an hour before. He was still gaunt, pale, and reeked of months without bathing. Remus Lupin, sitting next to Black, shared the gaunt appearance which was accented by shabby robes with years of wear on them but was even more terrified. Something had scared his inner wolf so badly that it refused to take over and force the transformation that night. Peter Pettigrew looked as if Death was personally chasing him but his attention was focused on the two Marauders he was forced to sit next to. Severus Snape was different from the rest.

He was resigned.

"Severus, what is going on?" Lupin asked the potions professor.

Snape shook his head. "Just accept your fate. It's so much easier that way."

Black chimed in, "Accept our fate? What are you talking about?"

"Resisting only makes it worse. Just let it happen. Afterwards, you can try to wash away the memories with Firewhiskey."

Lupin asked, "Why not just obliviate each other?"

Snape sighed. "It does not work. I have tried. Look, I despise all three of you but I'm willing to buy the booze." No one responded to Snape's offer. Black and Lupin were completely dumbstruck by it.

Eventually, Pettigrew added his own commentary. "Do you three realize what it sounds like you're talking about?" The other three men thought back over their conversation. Suddenly, all at once, all three became horrified.

"No!" Snape exclaimed. "Not that, you idiot. _She_ is coming."

Before anyone could ask about who he was referring to, the classroom door creaked open. In walked a third year Gryffindor girl. Lupin looked at her. "Miss Granger? What are you doing here?"

His question caused Snape to cringe. Hermione turned to look at Lupin. He gulped in trepidation at the expression on her face.

With the disturbance handled, Hermione made her way to the front of the classroom. Quietly, she carefully laid out several stacks of parchment, a few books, a pen set and a fresh box of chalk. She took her time organizing everything, humming a little ditty to herself in the process. Finally, after a painstaking period of anticipation on the part of the grown men, Hermione cleared her throat.

"I'm sure you four are aware of why we are here-"

Black interrupted, "Actually, I have no bloody clue-". An angry red spell shot past his head, nicking his ear. Black snapped his mouth shut with an audible click.

"As I was saying," Hermione began again, irritation colouring her voice, "I'm sure you four are aware of why we are here. All four of you are responsible for the tragedy that was barely averted this evening. I am, of course, speaking of one Harry Potter almost being injured."

Hermione paused her lecture to look over the four men. Snape was nearly whimpering. The other three were concerned, a bit scared, but mostly confused. Hermione approached the blackboard, extracting a perfect, brand new piece of chalk to write on the slate with. In an elegant cursive, Hermione proceeded to outline her upcoming lecture, entitled _How Five Idiots Endangered My Harry_.

Satisfied with her outline, Hermione returned to facing the four men. Giving them a baleful glare, she reached under the lectern. Snape's eyes widened. He began scrambling, doing anything and everything he could to escape his fate. He didn't dare speak a word while doing so since he knew from experience how that would only make things worse.

Black, Lupin and Pettigrew began to look worried. Snape's efforts had drawn their attention and his actions were causing them to gain a whole new understanding of their situation. Exactly why eluded all three of them.

Hermione then looked up at a back corner of the classroom. Black, Lupin and Pettigrew opted to ignore Snape in favour of trying to crane their heads around to see what she was looking at. What they saw caused a foul odour to fill the classroom.

"You will join them, won't you, Mr Dementor?"

A sound unlike anything any of the men had ever heard filled the classroom. The Dementor began whimpering. Once the creature had taken a seat at a fifth desk, Hermione cleared her throat.

"Now, before we go any further, I would like to explain to you what happened when my Harry was endangered at the end of last year."

Hermione paused just long enough to lovingly pat the oversized cricket bat she had pulled from beneath the lectern.

* * *

 _ **Thank you everyone for your continued support.**_


	24. Chapter 24

_**Working on my list of targets who have yet to experience the Adorably Violent Hermione. Rita was a popular one for myself and reviewers ideas. Here is her first encounter.**_

* * *

 **December 1994**

Hermione Granger was one angry witch. She had been looking forward to this night for weeks! She had dissuaded numerous girls from causing problems. For some, embarrassment had been a sufficient deterrent. For others, a more forceful hand had been required. The Beauxbatons Champion had proved to be particularly difficult to discourage. Being honest with herself, Hermione knew Fleur had not actually been permanently dissuaded. She would likely prove to be a problem in the future but that was not now.

In the end, Harry had asked her, Hermione Granger, to the Yule Ball. He had asked her the day it was announced but that had not discouraged other witches. He was Harry Potter and Hermione Granger had made sure he was the best catch, after all.

Normally, Hermione tried to keep up a rather plain front with regards to beauty. She wanted Harry's attention but did not want to have to deal with the attention from other boys. Some days, she put in a little bit of extra effort for Harry's sake as much as her own. His reactions always made the effort worth it. Tonight, however, she had gone all out.

It had taken Hermione just shy of six hours to get ready for the ball. Her hair was more cooperative than expected but finding her cosmetics tampered with had been a major setback. Hermione was happy that she had started as early as she did, otherwise she might have missed the opening dance with Harry. She suspected a certain french witch was responsible.

Rather than focus on the problems, Hermione had taken advantage of having Lavender as her roommate. Lavender seemed to have more cosmetics than Hermione expected a professional makeup artist to own. It was a simple task of implying that Harry might be available for a dance later that had earned the girl's cooperation.

When she had descended the stairs to the Gryffindor common room, Hermione had fought every impulse to smirk. Harry's jaw looked like it was trying to become acquainted with the stone floor. She had originally purchased a periwinkle blue set of dress robes that looked remarkably like a dress from the Victorian Era. Deciding that was an acceptable but not perfect dress, she had purchased another.

Hermione was glad she had bloomed a bit early, otherwise this dress wouldn't have worked. It was a modern, pure white gown that hung from one shoulder. It had a few lines of ruffles that cross her torso making the dress look it was a single piece of cloth that wrapped around. It had flowers and vines embroidered into the bodice using glittering silver thread accented with crystals to help make everything sparkle. Harry's attention was drawn there more than once during her descent. There was also an opening for her legs to slip through. That caught Harry's eyes a few times as well. The dress was just long enough to skirt the floor, but wouldn't interfere with any dancing they would do. The matching clutch and heels were important but Harry hadn't paid them any mind.

A joyous little voice inside Hermione had claimed victory when it took him over a minute to restart his through processes.

However, Harry was ultimately going to be unavailable to fulfill Hermione's admittedly vague offer to Lavender. Harry had escorted Hermione to the rose garden. The fluttering fairy lights twinkled as they had meandered through the winding paths decorated with stone statues, large and small, babbling brooks, various fountains and ornate benches, stone and wooden.

She and Harry had sneaked in several kisses, all gentle and chaste so as to not smudge her makeup. Hermione might have enjoyed getting more passionate in their exchanges but the constant interruptions of other couples walking past always dampened the mood. Worse, Hermione kept having to brush a flying beetle away from her face.

Eventually, Hermione had grown so irritated with the beetle that she snagged it right out of the air, mid-flight. Taking a closer look at the offending insect had caused Hermione's eyes to widen.

Five minutes later, Hermione was marching towards the Gryffindor Tower. After a quick stop to ask Neville if she could borrow Trevor, his ever-escaping toad, she had left Harry, guarded by Neville, at the Yule Ball. She growled to herself, knowing Harry would likely be approached to dance with other girls now, but her parting words had him voluntarily swearing not to dance until she got back.

She took the steps up to the Fourth Year Gryffindor Boys dormitory two at a time – Hermione was damned proud that she was able to do so in her heels without so much as the slightest of stumbles – to find Trevor. Throwing open the door, her eyes quickly located Trevor. The toad didn't have a moment to process that he had company before he was swooped up in her hands.

"You just had to do it. You just had to interrupt my night with my Harry." Hermione seemed to be talking to no one as she stormed to an unused classroom just outside the entrance to the Gryffindor Tower.

Sealing the classroom door behind her, Hermione proceeded to bespell every crack and window so nothing could escape. Quickly transfiguring a broken desk into a glass terrarium, Hermione set Trevor down in it before releasing the captured beetle and slamming the lid closed.

"You somehow got it in your head that tonight, _of all nights_ , you could interrupt my time with Harry," Hermione growled at the beetle. "Considering you seem to have no concerns as to other people's privacy, I'm sure you can share your own with Trevor, here."

Taking a deep breath, Hermione turned and made to leave the room. Just before closing the door behind her, Hermione looked back. "I'll check on you when Harry and I are done at the Ball. If you're still alive when I get back, we'll need to have a discussion about appropriate behaviour." Slamming the door closed, Hermione magically sealed it.

Composing herself, Hermione rushed back to Harry's side at the Ball.

"Is everything okay?" Harry asked once she returned. With a nod, Neville excused himself and his date, some Hufflepuff third year, and returned to the dance floor. It had shocked everyone except Harry and Hermione that he could dance quite well. His grandmother was a stickler for proper deportment which included the ability to dance properly when occasions demanded.

Hermione latched onto his offered arm. "Yes, though I'll have to take care of something after the Ball is over." Harry nodded, obviously expecting the response. "So, did you dance while I was away?"

Harry looked at her, askance. "You know me better than that. Of course, I didn't."

"Not even that Beauxbatons hussy?"

He sent a disapproving look in her direction. "No, but you really shouldn't call her that. She is a guest here and we are her hosts."

She promptly ignored his remonstration and rewarded his sitting out with a beaming smile. "I guess we'll just have to make up for lost time then." Dragging him out to the dance floor, Hermione leaned over to whisper in his ear. "I'm not letting you out of my arms for the rest of the night."

"I can live with that," Harry responded, a happy grin on his face as he pulled Hermione closer.

She might catch a bit of flak for putting that vile woman in a life-threatening situation, locking her away with Trevor. However, wrapped in Harry's arms, Hermione's mind was firmly in the here and now.

Back in the disused classroom on the seventh floor, a beetle trembled as a large toad stared it down. It had tried everything it could to escape. The terrarium was completely sealed, with slits just large enough for air but nothing else. In such a confined space, the beetle could not revert to its real form without significant injury. It would crush and kill the toad, but the beetle wasn't worried about that. Her concern was the shards of glass that would cut her to ribbons.

*croak*

Rita Skeeter, in her water beetle animagus form, skittered to the corner, staying as far away from Trevor as possible. She desperately hoped that her fellow prisoner had eaten recently.

*croak*

Trevor's eyes refocused on the skittering beetle. At that moment, Rita Skeeter went from planning vengeance to planning not to cross one Hermione Granger ever again.

* * *

 _ **Somehow I've now kept this up twenty-four days in a row. I have to credit my beta and other supporters. Some have even reviewed every chapter. This has been a fantastic experience.**_


	25. Chapter 25

_**The beginning of several years of torment.**_

* * *

 **June 1992**

Albus Dumbledore was walking back to his office after a rather uncomfortable conversation with one Harry Potter. The boy was under Poppy Pomfrey's care in the hospital wing after a rather nasty brush with the spectral form of Tom Riddle. Somehow, Harry had survived in surprising health and was merely being kept overnight for observation. Albus had feared the boy would be unconscious for days due to his run in with the esoteric magics used by Tom and his proxy Quirinus Quirrell.

Albus had known that Tom was not as dead as the average witch or wizard believed and celebrated. However, the nightmare of his existence was so profound that convincing anyone otherwise was an exercise in futility. In the ten years since the man's disappearance, Albus had watched for any sign of Tom returning to power. Just before the school year began, rumours had begun circulating among the less reputable crowds. There was nothing concrete, nothing definitive, but the signs were beginning to corroborate the rumours.

Historically not one to give divination more than a passing thought, Albus had begun paying special attention to the vague and mysterious art ever since his interview with Sybill Trelawney. It had been the first time he had ever witnessed a prophecy being given and, loath as he was to admit it, it terrified him. The idea that his future was not entirely of his own making, that someone or something held a power over him and his destiny or his fate, had conflicted with everything he had ever believed in his long life. Bearing witness to that same prophecy becoming partially fulfilled had shaken Albus to his core.

Now, Harry Potter was lying in bed and his friends Hermione Granger, Neville Longbottom and Ron Weasley were prevented from seeing him. Albus knew isolating Harry was a questionable decision at best but the boy could not be permitted to retell his story. Information control was Albus's greatest weapon against Tom and his followers. Sadly, it was also Tom's greatest weapon against the Light, as well.

Just before Albus had departed the hospital wing, he had permitted Harry to ask whatever he wished. Unfortunately, the young Gryffindor had asked the one question whose answer was possibly the most closely guarded secret in the entire British magical world. Only one person knew that secret in its entirety, though at least two more knew of it in part. Albus, knowing the full reason why Tom had targeted Harry and why that spelled his own eventual defeat, could not trust an eleven year old child with that secret.

A partial answer, that Harry managed to survive when no one else Tom targeted did, did not seem adequate. As such, Albus decided that no answer was better than a lie. He knew it would upset Harry. The boy had become much more inquisitive after befriending the young Miss Granger back on Halloween. He was no longer satisfied with being given textbook answers. Harry wanted to understand the whys and wherefores that lead to the answers. He sought out explanations for information that most others decades his senior took on faith. For Albus, it was like looking in a mirror and seeing his eleven year old self.

He and Harry were both Gryffindors as opposed to Ravenclaws. While the distinction had faded in Albus's mind, there was a reason Harry was made a Lion rather than a Raven. The proof could be seen if one were to look at his actions that night. No Raven would have pursued Quirinus after being dismissed by a professor. Only a Lion would have defied authority to do what was right rather than easy. Albus smiled at that thought. It reflected well on the man who young Harry would become.

Albus approached his office entrance. The gargoyle moved to the side without waiting for the password. Albus frowned. He liked thinking up new passwords and giving them. It was good motivation to try out various new sweets. Using the names of sweets as passwords was wonderfully effective since there was a book where every password ever used was recorded. The ink in the book turned red whenever a new password had been previously used. It made for a wonderfully efficient cataloging system.

Recently, he had been tasting muggle sweets, trying to find something he enjoyed more than the lemon drops he had taken a fancy to more than ten years before. Finding those had been a particularly joyous occasion. There was nothing quite like them in the wizarding shops and they were so very delicious.

Reaching the top of the spiral staircase, Albus opened the door to his office. The incident between Harry, Quirinus and Tom would cause a rather tenuous situation in the government to worsen if not handled properly. Even if Albus did not approach Fudge and relate the events, the man would find out what had happened. Nothing was more widespread or cancerous than rumour. No, first Albus had to contact Nicholas and Perenelle and convince them their Philosopher's Stone needed to be destroyed. If Tom was willing to infiltrate Gringotts and then later Hogwarts to get to it, it was far too dangerous an object to be permitted to continue to exist.

If he were a lesser man, Albus might ask forgiveness rather than permission. Idling fingering the rufescent stone in his pocket, he resisted the temptation as he sat down to compose his first of many letters which Fawkes would be delivering that night. Looking up, Albus was glad to see all of the portraits were asleep. He was not in the mood for their usual, unhelpful commentary given the stressful nature of the past evening.

Two hours, and a disgruntled phoenix later, Albus relaxed back into his highback chair. The imposing piece of furniture had been crafted two centuries before for the express purpose of being gifted to the then headmaster of Hogwarts. Supposedly, it was a bribe to prevent the expulsion of a student but the journal that might contain the true story was misplaced several decades later. Regardless, the chair was surprisingly comfortable in spite of its appearance, though the charms which caused that had to be refreshed every decade or so.

Sinking into the cushions, Albus reached out by habit to a crystal bowl resting on the corner of his desk. Rather than resort to a headache potion, which would have Poppy chastise him considering how many he usually consumed, Albus hoped that indulging in the sweet and sour combination of a few lemon drops would calm his mind and sooth his spirit. As his hand touched crystal, Albus's eyes darted to the bowl.

It was empty.

Furrowing his brow, Albus opened the top left drawer of his desk, where he kept his supply of unopened packages.

They were all gone.

Whipping his wand out, Albus's eyes scanned his office. Something was dreadfully wrong. He had purchased several new packages just a few weeks ago and, despite rumours to the contrary, he did not consume them in bulk. Normally, a single package would last him a month.

Considering Tom had been in the castle that night, even in the form of a wraith-like entity, such caution was only prudent. There were many things, books, magical trinkets, and scrolls among other things, that were kept in the headmaster's office for a reason. The danger they posed made the restricted nature of the office even more essential.

Seeing no one, and his magic revealing no one, Albus turned to his companion. "Fawkes, has anyone other than me been in this office tonight?" Fawkes was a bit of a jokester who liked to pick apart Albus's words. It necessitated many qualifiers whenever he directly addressed the creature.

Fawkes trilled a tone that Albus interpreted as an affirmative response.

"Did they touch anything?"

Another affirmative trill.

Taking a moment, Albus pondered the situation. The only thing he knew was missing was his stash of lemon drops. "Did they touch anything other than my lemon drops?"

A third affirmative trill. Albus frowned. "Aside from the floor, the top left desk drawer and the sweets bowl?"

Fawkes rolled his head back and forth. Finally a useful answer. Whoever had entered had done so with the explicit purpose of going after Albus's lemon drops. It made no sense, however, considering the wealth of information in the office. The effort required to enter without detection supported that the thief must be highly skilled. Such skill would be wasted on anything so frivolous as stealing less than a Galleon's worth of sweets.

Albus's eyes widened. "Did this person leave anything behind?" he asked Fawkes.

Fawkes hopped off his perch and landed on Albus's desk. Picking up a small envelope, lost in the stacks of parchment, he held it out for Albus to take.

Knowing the Phoenix wouldn't have picked up and offered anything harmful, Albus opened the letter. Its contents were a single sheet of parchment with a single line written in neat, looping script that he did not recognize.

 _When someone asks you a question, you answer them._

Flying down the stairs, Albus ran towards the infirmary as fast as his legs could carry him. Arriving at the hospital wing, he looked inside. Harry was fast asleep on his assigned bed. Entering Poppy's office, Albus found the matron filling out some of her end of year reports.

"Poppy," he started. "Has Mr Potter left his bed this evening?"

Poppy gave Albus a humourless glare. "Of course not. You were here when I gave him the Dreamless Sleep draught. Nothing is waking that boy until the morning."

Half relieved, half panicked, Albus bid a good night to Poppy and returned to his office. Just as he was about to continue his investigation, the Floo flared to life.

"Albus," Cornelius Fudge's voice filled the office. "What is this I hear about an incident involving Harry Potter?"

Fawkes watched as Albus, frustrated at the Minister's timing, tried to address the other man's concerns. Tucking his head under his wing, Fawkes thought back to earlier in the evening when a very angry first year Gryffindor girl had somehow found her way past the gargoyle. Deciding to help, Fawkes had disposed of Albus's spare lemon drops after the girl had emptied the bowl. It was one of life's true pleasures, seeing Albus all a flutter over something as mundane as missing sweets.

* * *

 _ **Over 100 thousand views, over 500 reviews, over 400 favorites, over 600 follows. Consider my mind blown.**_


	26. Chapter 26

_**A little late today. The first venture into sixth year.**_

* * *

 **December 1996**

Tension filled the Gryffindor Common Room. One of the Fourth Year girls, Romilda Vane, had just attempted to give Harry Potter a box of cauldron cakes as a Christmas present. Lavender shook her head. Every girl in the tower knew how devoted Harry was to Hermione. Everyone in the school knew how protective Hermione was of Harry. Sure, she had relaxed in the last year but it was downright foolish to cross the witch.

The previous few months had been chaotic. Katie Bell had some nasty encounter with something that meant she was still in St. Mungo's after two months. She would likely be there for another three or four, Lavender had heard. Harry was badly shaken by the incident. Katie and the other chasers, Angelina and Alicia, both graduated, were among the few females that could be near Harry without Hermione making her presence known. There had been some minor issues between the trio and Hermione through third year but the situation had resolved itself, much to the relief of the rest of the house.

With Katie hurt, Harry had held a small tryout to fill the spot. No one else in the house had any experience as a Chaser on the team so Harry felt it the best way to handle it. Then Cormac McLaggen had shown up for tryout.

Cormac had many positive traits, Lavender confessed to herself. He was handsome, confident, reasonably skilled and moderately powerful. He also had many flaws. He was more arrogant than Malfoy on his worst day, couldn't comprehend why anyone would say "no" to him and simply a right pain in the arse. Lavender was quite proud of her bum and could do well without a pain in it. She had turned down his various offers a dozen times in the last year alone.

Lavender looked around to find Cormac currently talking to Ginny Weasley who was pointedly ignoring him. Two days before he had learned that Harry, Hermione and a few others were invited to Professor Slughorn's Christmas party and done everything he could to convince one of the girls to take him along as their date. Why he had approached Hermione was anyone's guess. Padma had told Parvati who had told Lavender that his acne scars resulting from Hermione's response could take years to heal.

 _Slap!_

Lavender giggled to herself. Whatever Cormac had just said to Ginny had resulted in a bright red handprint accompanying his other facial disfigurements.

Turning back to the focus of everyone else's attention, Lavender saw Romilda sweating like crazy. Hermione had been staring at the girl with a blank expression for nearly five minutes. Lavender thought back to every other confrontation she had ever witnessed between Hermione and some girl and could not think of any other occasion where Hermione was as expressionless.

Looking at Harry, she could see he was still angry. Ever since Halloween of their first year, Harry had made it clear that he was with Hermione. Still, every year he had to fend off advances from at least a dozen different witches. Some no longer counted in Lavender's mind. Ginny Weasley was a given. Nothing Harry or Hermione ever did managed to dissuade the girl. It was almost like the sun rising in the east. It always would, just like Ginny would always make a play for Harry.

Lavender thought back to a rumour that Katie Bell had made a bid for Harry back in third year. It was a few days after that rumour spread that the situation had calmed down and Hermione no longer threatened to leave Gryffindor without a Quidditch team. After that, no other Gryffindor had made a serious attempt to win Harry's heart until Romilda. Ginny didn't count.

Other girls from other houses never seemed to learn their lesson. Lavender had often wondered what they found so appealing about Harry. She knew what she did – Harry was sweet, kind, caring, funny, handsome, intelligent, and so many other things – but if the other girls only saw his wealth or his fame, they were the last girls in the world Harry might pick should something happen between him and Hermione. Lavender suspected Malfoy had a better chance of winning Harry's heart than Harry and Hermione breaking up.

Lavender's eyes caught movement. Hermione had stepped forward, closing the gap between her and Romilda. Every Gryffindor stepped further back. The only sound anyone heard was Cormac muttering to one of the other fourth year girls.

 _Slap!_

Every girl around Lavender smirked with her at that wonderful sound.

"Romilda." Hermione's voice filled the common room. Lavender watched as Hermione just shook her head. "At least, Fleur is worthy competition. If this is your best attempt, you aren't even worth a footnote. Even Stalker Girl over there deserves that much." Everyone watched as Hermione pointed to Ginny.

Hermione turned to walk away. It was unprecedented. Hermione Granger never drew her wand during the entire incident. She cast no hex, no curse, no jinx, used no magic of any kind. She simply walked away.

No one in the common room knew how to react. Harry had done wonders in keeping Hermione from killing them all but, without him stopping her, she had never done nothing. Thinking a moment, Lavender wondered whether or not everyone in the castle owed Harry a few favours for that. Hermione did use rather harmful methods from time to time.

The gathered crowd began to disperse. Just as she was about to breathe a sigh of relief that no one had needed to duck out of the way of flying spells, Lavender heard Harry's voice. "Leave her alone, McLaggan."

Seeing Harry standing between Hermione and Cormac, Lavender wondered what she had missed during her musings.

"Oh, come on, Harry," Cormac practically sneered. "Hermione is free to choose whoever she wants to escort to Slughorn's party I just decided she should be with the best, that's all."

Lavender could almost hear Harry's teeth grinding. "She told you 'no' two days ago, or do you not recall how your face was disfigured?"

Cormac laughed. "I just caught her at a bad time. She didn't properly consider my offer so I thought I'd try again. Besides, the fun she and I could get up to after the party-"

Before she realized what happened, Lavender saw Cormac on the ground holding his groin. The idiot was rolling around, moaning in agony. Flicking her eyes to Harry, she saw him shift his weight back to center as his foot returned to the stone floor.

Harry turned to his girlfriend. "I need to go burn these shoes, Hermione. Mind waiting for me for a bit?" Turning his head back to the sad mass at his feet, Harry scowled. "And stop showing up to Quidditch practice, McLaggen. You aren't on the team. You have never been on the team. Bloody hell, you dropped the Quaffle nearly every time it was passed to you. Neville hates flying and he'd be a better Chaser than you." Looking over at Neville, sitting in a chair by the fireplace, Harry said, "No offense, mate."

Neville looked over at Harry. "You just compared me to McLaggan, Harry. How am I _not_ supposed to take offense?"

Harry winced. "I said you were better than him."

Neville snorted. "Talk about a backhanded compliment." Lavender watched as the two boys broke down laughing. Once they regained control over themselves, Neville just waved the whole thing off as Harry turned to Hermione who had barely paid any mind to their byplay.

Seeing the look in Hermione's eyes just before she dragged Harry out of the portrait hole, Lavender realized no one would see the pair for a while.

Lavender fanned herself. Seeing Harry stand up for Hermione always got her blood pumping. Lavender wasn't sure there was any girl in the castle that didn't feel a tinge of lust for him when he did so. With a sigh, she muttered, "If I didn't have to fight Hermione for him, he'd be worth it." Stepping over a moaning Cormac, Lavender made her way up to the girls staircase.

"Hrm, maybe I could get Neville to take me to the party tomorrow."

* * *

 _ **Only five more days until my goal. Time for the final stretch. This story will not end after one month but I will most likely need a break at that point.**_


	27. Chapter 27

_**Dumbledore has more things coming his way.**_

* * *

 **September 1992**

Harry Potter was headed to the Gryffindor Tower after the Start-of-Term Feast when his head of house cornered him, passing along a message that the headmaster wished to see him. It was rather off-putting since one Hermione Granger was waiting in the common room to wish him a good night. Harry really liked it when she wished him a good night.

His summer had been the best he could recall. After a few days at the Dursleys, Hermione had called him on the telephone only for his Uncle Vernon to hang up on her. She had been polite and soft spoken. She did not behave like Harry expected some wizards or witches would, shouting into the receiver not understanding that modern technology allowed whispers to be heard around the world.

Hermione had arrived the next day, extremely irritated at Uncle Vernon's uncouth behaviour. Harry had descended the stairs when he heard her voice to find her lecturing all three Dursleys in such spectacular fashion that a Mother Superior would have taken eager notes.

Following that, Harry's life had improved drastically. Hermione and her parents welcomed him into their home a few days every other week and the Dursleys were much more tolerable. While they did not suddenly become pleasant people, Harry could at least stand being in the same general vicinity as his family after Hermione's intervention.

On the days when Harry was not a guest in the Granger home, Hedwig was put to work, carrying letters back and forth with an almost absurd level of frequency. However, once July arrived, Hedwig began failing to deliver the letters. Both Harry and Hermione had been shocked and concerned as Hedwig was returning injured even when she managed to protect the letter from whoever was stealing Harry's correspondence.

Harry had been very upset at Hedwig getting injured. She was the first present he ever remembered receiving, excepting the insulting tokens the Dursleys might toss his way if they bothered to remember, and a dear friend. Hermione had taken that as a personal challenge. Within a week, she had managed to equip Hedwig with a thin but durable armor and razor sharp attachments for her talons and the leading edges of her wings. Hermione had even gone to the trouble of making them stylish on top of functional. No letter went missing after that, though Hedwig did occasionally arrive with bits of blood splattered on her new garments.

Eventually, a badly wounded House-elf arrived at 4 Privet Drive trying to convince Harry that he should not return to Hogwarts. Harry had promptly refused which nearly ended in disaster as the House-elf tried to cause trouble during one of Uncle Vernon's very important business dinners. One bark and spread wings from Hedwig had caused the House-elf to tremble before reluctantly leaving.

Hermione had not been pleased with the surprise visit from the House-elf nor his attempts to interfere with her letters to and from Harry. It had taken Harry the better part of three days to convince her not to find and interrogate the nearest House-elf for more information. Harry had not been sure he really wanted to know what she might do to interrogate whatever poor House-elf she came across. However, he had noticed how the idea of someone interfering with their visits and letter writing caused Hermione to grow dark and angry, as if the House-elf wasn't the first one to try.

The remainder of the summer holidays had been much like the beginning, the best days Harry could ever remember in England. The only catch had been that Hermione started trying to sneak into the guest room to watch Harry sleep. Her parents had not been pleased but were glad she limited herself to watching him. When September had arrived, Harry had been staying with the Grangers in order to keep the Dursleys as far from platform nine and three-quarters as possible.

Eight hours of cuddling with Hermione, talking with Neville, and indulging in sweets off the cart later, that Hermione had insisted they feed to one another, the train had pulled to a stop in Hogsmeade. The Sorting had gone faster than Harry remembered but there were also fewer students to be sorted. Hermione had guessed that in the last year of the Wizarding War, when people were most under the umbrella of fear that Voldemort represented, they had fewer kids than before. The only notable thing was when the youngest Weasley child, and only girl, had been sorted into Gryffindor. Percy, Fred and George had been proud, the twins letting everyone know it. Ron had grumbled about being glad the Sorting was over so the feast could begin.

McGonagall had escorted Harry to the headmaster's office. She mumbled a password just quietly enough that Harry couldn't make it out and the stone gargoyle moved out of the way. At McGonagall's encouragement, Harry walked up the spiral staircase and knocked on the heavy wooden door.

"Enter."

Opening the door, Harry looked inside to see Dumbledore sitting behind a large desk with a rather uncomfortable expression on his face. At the edge of the desk was a beautiful crystal bowl, filled to the brim with yellow sweets. On the right was a perch with a beautiful red bird. Harry had never seen anything like it before. Hedwig was much prettier in Harry's admittedly biased opinion. After all, Hermione agreed with him that Hedwig was the most beautiful owl in the world.

Returning his gaze to the headmaster, Harry spoke. "You asked to see me, sir?"

Dumbledore nodded. "Yes. I was hoping to have a few words with you before the school year began." He gestured to the chairs nearest Harry, offering a seat.

Harry shrugged and sat down. "What about, sir?"

The older wizard shifted uncomfortably. "It has been brought to my attention that requiring you to go back to your relatives this past summer, even when you had an offer to stay with Miss Granger, may have been presumptuous on my part."

Nodding, Harry recalled the conversation the headmaster was referring to. Hermione had extended an offer for Harry to stay with her all summer. The headmaster had rather firmly insisted that Harry return to the Dursleys for much of the summer, though "a few days" to visit friends might be acceptable. Harry decided not to tell Dumbledore that Hermione had not had her parents' permission to make her offer, a fact Harry had learned on his first visit when he tried to thank them for the offer. It had spurred a conversation about how the children's headmaster saw fit to dictate where Harry lived outside of the school year.

"Oh? What do you mean, sir?" Harry asked.

As if on cue, the headmaster's stomach rumbled loudly and an expression of pain filled his face. The bird off to the side trilled in laughter.

"Now is not the time, Fawkes," the older wizard intoned. "Harry, someone made their displeasure known to me through a series of anonymous letters and stealing my lemon drops."

Harry blinked. _Letters and stolen sweets? What on Earth is he talking about?_ "Sir?"

As if he realized the absurdity of his statement, the headmaster waved his hand in the air. "It is of no consequence. I just wanted to let you know that should you have the offer again, I will not interfere." Harry was very happy hearing this. "However," Harry slumped, knowing it was too good to be true, "for your relatives' sakes as well as your own, you should stay a few weeks with them so that the protection your mother's love and sacrifice left you does not fade prematurely."

When Dumbledore did not continue, Harry realized he would get no further explanation out of the older wizard. "Is there anything else, sir?"

Another bout of loud rumbling filled the office. Once again, Fawkes' trill was full of laughter.

The headmaster grimaced at Harry. "No, that will be all. Professor McGonagall is waiting to escort you back to the Gryffindor Tower given that it is after curfew. Have a pleasant year, Harry."

Dismissed, Harry made his way down to McGonagall. Neither said anything during the walk back to the tower. Once inside, Hermione had cornered Harry in the common room.

"So?" Hermione prompted.

"He apologized for making me go back to the Dursleys, not realizing your offer didn't have your parents' approval." When Hermione's face reddened, Harry pulled her into a hug.

Speaking into Harry's chest, Hermione asked, "Did he say anything else?"

Harry shook his head. "No, but there was something odd." Hermione pulled back and looked up at him. "His stomach kept grumbling and it looked painful." A proud smirk lit up Hermione's face. Harry gave her as firm a look as he could. "What did you do?"

"Nothing," Hermione answered, a little too innocently. Harry's suspicion was immediately confirmed. "I just wrote him a few letters and got a bit of help from Fawkes."

"Help with what?"

"I learned that Fawkes is a bit like your father used to be. He helped me prank Professor Dumbledore." Harry looked at her, sceptical. "You saw the bowl of lemon drops on his desk?" Harry nodded. "Let's just say that Fawkes helped me switch them out with a special recipe. Older people do have to worry about being regular, after all."

* * *

 _ **The Adorably Violent Hermione is ramping up her treatment of Dumbledore.**_


	28. Chapter 28

_**Calmer chapter this time.**_

* * *

 **February 1994**

Harry was in the most dangerous situation he could recall. It was more dangerous than a cerberus. It was more dangerous than confronting a possessed Professor Quirrell. It was more dangerous than battling a twenty meter basilisk with a longsword. Harry was standing between an angry, sleep deprived Hermione Granger and a terrified Neville Longbottom, the intended target of her wrath.

Summoning up his courage, Harry started his labour of Hercules. Using the most soothing voice he could muster, Harry tried to calm her. "Hermione, you need to calm down."

"Do you know what he did?" Hermione seethed.

Harry put up his hands, trying to placate her. "I know exactly what he did. Neville accidentally lost the parchment he wrote the tower passwords down on."

"He shouldn't have written it down in the first place! Even Professor McGonagall-" Harry interrupted her rant, the thought of which was something that would have had lesser wizards quaking in fear.

"At least a third of our housemates write it down. McGonagall is changing it so often that everyone is having trouble keeping it straight. A new password practically every day is bloody ridiculous regardless of the circumstances. You shouldn't blame Neville for that. Besides, he's our friend. He wouldn't hurt either of us intentionally." Neville nodded furiously behind Harry. A quick glare from Harry told Neville to stop moving and drawing attention to himself.

Hermione roared. "But he let in Sirius Black! The man who's trying to kill you!"

"You know better than that, Hermione," Harry said, colder than he had spoken to Hermione in a very long time. Hearing his tone, Hermione shrank in on herself. When her gaze dropped to the floor and her wand slacked in her hand, Harry urgently gestured for Neville to make his escape. Neville took advantage of the opportunity with alacrity.

"Hermione," Harry said soothingly, "Neville made a mistake. He's already apologized to me for it, not that I thought he needed to in the first place. And, we don't know what Black was doing here. Coming to the tower would be a stupid plan considering his failed attempt back on Halloween. Security has been tighter and there are a lot of potential witnesses here. On top of that, Black was standing over Ron, not me. Our trunks are at the feet of our beds and have our bloody names on them. He could have easily identified whose bed it was just by looking at the trunks. He wouldn't have had to open any of the curtains. Even if he had moved the curtains to peek inside, none of the boys would have woken up. We all sleep like the dead. We have to thanks to Weasley's snoring. So, if he was truly after me, why was he acting like he was going to kill Ron?"

Hermione shrunk in on herself further. "But . . . I mean . . . What if you'd been hurt?" She was nearly in tears. Harry gently pulled her into a hug.

"Then we'd be having a very different conversation but I'm fine, so we're not." He began rubbing small circles on her back.

The two teens stood in the common room, holding each other, drawing as much comfort as they could from their embrace. Neither knew how much time had passed. The only sound that came from them was the occasional sniffle from Hermione.

Finally, Harry pulled back from the hug. "You know I'm careful. You and your mum drilled that into me this last summer." Harry winced remembering her anger about his going after the basilisk. He was glad that her parents intervened on his behalf. Mrs Granger's lecture had been far more tolerable but just as effective. Harry now knew where Hermione learned her tactics for causing guilt trips. One thing was for sure, Hermione had a lot left to learn and Harry dreaded the day when she fully mastered the art. Knowing Hermione and her penchant for learning, it would arrive much sooner than he would like.

He continued. "I won't go looking for trouble. Besides, you're with me all of the time anyway. If I ever got into trouble, you'd scare him away just like you did to Malfoy, Flint, Crabbe and Goyle today during the Quidditch Match." Hermione grinned at the reminder.

Over the course of the year, Harry had experienced some night terrors thanks to the presence of the Dementors. Watching his mother die in front of him, over and over, caused him no end of anguish. Knowing that it was his only memory of his mother made it even worse. Hermione had taken to sneaking into his dorm to soothe him at night. She had helped tremendously.

Regardless, word had gotten around about his sensitivity to the Dementors. The only other people that had trouble were those that came into near direct contact with them. Harry's only close call had occurred during the first match of the year. The Dementors had encroached on the pitch but thankfully stayed far enough away to prevent any accidents. What had worried Harry at the time was how every once in a while a few would float a little too close before a horrid shriek would cause them to retreat. No one he had talked to had an explanation for the behaviour but Harry had his suspicions given the smirk on Hermione's face afterwards.

Pulling his mind back to the present, Harry moved towards the couch in front of the common room fireplace, pulling Hermione with him. He took a seat and Hermione immediately curled up in his lap. Knowing he had to keep her distracted from the situation with Neville, Harry brought up the Gryffindor versus Ravenclaw match earlier that day.

"Have you decided what you're going to do to them for trying to disrupt the match?" Harry asked.

"Nothing," Hermione muttered into the crook of Harry's neck.

"Oh? I would think you have something planned."

Hermione nodded. "Oh, I do, but not for that. They tried to take advantage of the trouble you have with Dementors. The look on their face when you fired your Patronus at them was priceless but that was you getting one over on them, not me."

Both teens chuckled at the memory. Rumour had it that the four Slytherin boys had to go change their robes after Harry's reaction to their little ploy.

"Are you going to let me in on your plan?"

Hermione snuggled in closer. "Maybe tomorrow."

"Not even a hint?" Harry asked, a slightly petulant tone in his voice.

"Hmm, I suppose I can share one minor detail with you." Hermione shifted a bit, leaning back against the arm of the couch, draping her legs over Harry's lap. "Dobby wants to help."

Harry muttered something about girlfriends keeping secrets. "Anything else?"

"You'll find out soon enough." Hermione pulled Harry down to lay against her. "Tonight, I just want to hold you. It's too bad we can't sneak off to the Chamber. Sally would make a good guard basilisk for the night."

"Sally? I thought we agreed on Bessy? And weren't we calling her Medusa before that?"

Hermione gave Harry a bemused glare. "Are you going to argue with your girlfriend while she's in her nightclothes or snuggle with her?"

Sensibly, Harry opted to oblige her earlier request. As he laid his head on her chest, Harry wrapped his arms around her warm form. They would likely catch hell from McGonagall if she found them curled up together in the morning but Harry and Hermione needed each other.

* * *

 _ **Harry is a wonderfully calming influence on the Adorably Violent Hermione. At least, some of the time.**_


	29. Chapter 29

_**Twenty-nine days. Twenty-nine chapters. Woot.**_

* * *

 **August 1995**

Hermione Granger was one happy witch. She was curled up with her boyfriend in front of a warm fire and reading a rare book. She had complained about being cooped up under Professor Dumbledore's orders. Rather, Harry was under orders to remain at 12 Grimmauld Place where there was a constant presence of Order of the Phoenix members. Hermione had refused to leave him there with only Ron Weasley as company of the same age. Plus, the rest of the Weasley family was there, including Stalker Girl.

Earlier that evening, Hermione had needed to remind the red headed girl that not only was Harry not interested, Harry's relationship status had a very clear mark in the "taken" column. His agreement with Hermione even explicitly stated that point.

Ginny had not left her room in the hours since Hermione issued the reminder. Hermione speculated that was most likely because the younger girl did not want anyone to see the krup snout that had replaced her lower face. If Ginny wanted to follow Harry around like a lost puppy, Hermione felt it was her duty to help the girl to look the part.

In response to her complaints of being cooped up and her handling of Ginny, Sirius had shown Hermione where a selection of rare tomes were shelved. Hermione had practically vibrated with barely restrained glee at the sight of the publications. Half of them had been out of print for over a century. Others were thought lost by the masses and Hermione had been shown the only known copies in existence.

At Harry's request, she had only grabbed one book. She would forever deny that she had begged and pleaded with him to let her take more than one. Such behaviour was unbecoming of a young lady.

Hermione looked up from her reading, feeling that she deserved a short break after working through three hundred pages of Middle English. Harry was still writing his response to Gabrielle Delacour's letter.

Gabrielle had been a sore point for them for months after Harry had pulled the girl out of the Great Lake during the second task. She was an adorable, happy girl with a permanent smile that could melt the heart of anyone, even Professor Snape, etched into her face. She had followed Harry around, much like Ginny tried, but to much greater success. Somehow, no matter what Hermione tried to do to encourage the eight year old to go back to the Beauxbatons' carriage, she managed to find a way to get Hermione to tolerate her presence for a while longer. It wasn't until nearly May that Hermione accepted the girl just wanted everyone around her to be as happy as she was and play dolls with her. As a token peace offering, Hermione had suggested to Harry they give Gabrielle a doll for her ninth birthday. Hermione was sure ensuing squeal had to have broken some kind of volume or pitch record. She made a mental note to research that.

Since their stay at 12 Grimmauld Place began, Harry had written the little girl almost every week. He even managed to convince Hermione to contribute a few words which caused the girl to respond with five pages specifically for Hermione. There had even been a "Not for Harry" notice written on the outside, though she had written inside that Hermione could share it if she wanted to. After planning on holding out for a few hours, Hermione caved to Harry's pout in twenty seconds.

"How is Gabrielle doing?" Hermione asked her boyfriend.

Without looking up, Harry replied, "She's doing well. Her mare just gave birth to a foal and she can't decide on a name. She asked for a few ideas but knowing her she'll have named him before I even received the letter." Hermione nodded her agreement.

"Anything else?"

"Well, she's down to begging for us to come visit. They're at their Bordeaux estate. She also instructed me to tell you that Fleur would not be there for the next two weeks due to her Gringotts training here in London. Apparently she's sequestered until her training is complete but before the communication ban went into effect Fleur was complaining about some 'pig-headed Curse-Breaker' not leaving her alone."

Hermione grumbled. She did not like hearing about Fleur. They may have come to an understanding over Gabrielle and even a partial one regarding Harry – Harry really was the best candidate either could think of – but Hermione still viewed the older Veela as a threat, however miniscule, to her territory.

Before Harry could continue with Gabrielle's latest updates, a loud screeching voice filled the room. "What are you reading? No respectable witch would be caught dead reading a book like that!"

Hermione glared at the source of the horrendously offensive voice. "Mrs Weasley, what business of yours is it what I read?"

"While you're under my care, it is entirely my business." The red haired harridan reached out to snatch up the book. Hermione jerked the book away, out of the woman's reach.

"We are not under your care. In case you've somehow forgotten, this is Sirius's house. He is considered a respectable adult by society and has been fully acquitted in the public eye for those accusations back in '81. He is responsible for us in every legal sense. He is the one my parents are trusting to look after us. He is Harry's godfather and legal guardian, _not you._ "

Mrs Weasley huffed. "Either way, you shouldn't be reading such things. That book has dark magic in it and no proper witch or wizard should be reading about such things. Give it here."

Hermione snorted. She was never one to subscribe to the head-in-the-sand approach to things. It was why she was able to help Harry during the last four years of Hogwarts. She sought knowledge. She loved learning. And if she happened to use that knowledge to keep overly ambitious witches away from her Harry, who was anyone to complain?

"I think you should go talk to Sirius before you confiscate a book he allowed me to read. He was standing there with me when I picked it out."

"Obviously, I'll have to have a talk with him. He shouldn't have let you even near such a thing. He has no business-"

Hermione sat and watched at Mrs Weasley continued to talk about how poor a guardian she felt Sirius was. After half a minute, Hermione turned away from the older witch and snuggled into Harry's side who had continued to write his letter to Gabrielle, pointedly ignoring the argument between the two witches.

Soaking up Harry's presence, Hermione waited until he finished his letter, sealed it, cooed over Hedwig for several minutes, and sent the owl on her way to France.

"Ready to go to bed, Hermione?" Harry stretched and yawned to play up his exhaustion.

Hermione nodded. The two disentangled themselves and made for the stairs. Sirius, at Hermione's encouragement, had given the two teens adjoining bedrooms as soon as Harry arrived. Hermione's bed had yet to be used since.

As they reached the base of the stairs, Harry looked back. "Are you going to unfreeze Mrs Weasley before we go to bed?"

Hermione glanced at the woman, frozen in mid-tirade. Her eyes were doing their best to burn holes in Hermione, though they were having difficulty looking far enough to her side to still see the teens at the base of the stairs.

"I don't think so." Hermione sleepily replied after a moment. "The spell should fade in a few minutes. I don't want her disturbing our sleep as soon as she gets free."

Hermione giggled to herself thinking about how "a few" usually implied two or three. She idly wondered if Mrs Weasley had used the toilet recently. It would be several hours before the spell actually faded, long enough for Hermione to get in some quality sleepy cuddles with Harry.

Sirius could deal with the annoyance in the morning. The woman was lucky Hermione valued Harry cuddles more than addressing irritants.

* * *

 _ **There is more in store for the family of redheads.**_


	30. Chapter 30

_**Our first step into Year 7.**_

* * *

 **October 1997**

Lord Voldemort marched at the head of his group of followers, the Death Eaters. Their destination was the castle that had stood for a thousand years, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It was where he first learned he was more than the boys who bullied him at the orphanage. It was where he found his first home. It was where he was rejected because of his unknown parentage and muggle family name. It was where Albus Dumbledore refused him. It was the symbol he would control or, failing that, destroy.

Glancing back over his assembled underlings, Voldemort frowned. He only had one hundred witches and wizards at his command. He had expected several times that when he had been restored to his mature physical form. However, when he summoned his followers to the family plot at the graveyard in Little Hangleton, most never showed. It took months for him to learn why. They had run and gone into hiding and never looked back.

Just over a handful of those traitorous families remained in Britain. The Malfoys, the Crabbes, the Goyles, and a few others. Lord Voldemort had made his displeasure known to little effect. Lucius had refused to raise the banner or contribute any funding despite any punishment sent his way. The man had said something about a creature far more terrifying than he, Lord Voldemort, could ever be. Any former follower who had a child at Hogwarts from 1991 to present refused the call to arms.

Frustrated, Voldemort tried to pad his ranks with giants, trolls, vampires, werewolves, Dementors and any other number of dark creatures. He spoke to them with honeyed words and empty promises of power and revenge. Many followed him at first, at least until they learned he was targeting Harry Potter and Hogwarts. There was something about the blasted boy and the hallowed school that scared them away.

When he had possessed that fool, Quirrell, nothing about Potter or the school seemed in any way frightening. Nothing Barty Crouch Jr told him prior to being exposed and caught implied anything new about the boy or building. Even that disgusting woman, Umbridge, refused to cooperate and share what had apparently changed. Voldemort grumbled as he remembered her words.

"Leave Potter alone. Don't seek revenge. You will lose everything."

The haunted look on her face would have scared off lesser beings but not Lord Voldemort. He was above such petty concerns and warnings of those lowly fools. The woman was still imprisoned in the cellar of Riddle Manor for her foolish audacity.

Voldemort turned his angry scarlet eyes towards the welcoming glow of the castle. It was like a beacon in the night, guiding any seeking shelter to it. He snorted. It was likely Gryffindor or Hufflepuff that designed it in such a way. Salazar Slytherin would have made the great castle more foreboding, more imposing, a symbol of strength that terrified any who might dream of challenging its authority.

"Bellatrix, announce our presence."

Freeing Bellatrix had proven to be far more difficult than Voldemort had first estimated. He had expected the Dementors to side with him, jumping at the opportunity to be let loose on the masses. However, when he approached his most faithful, they swarmed. Voldemort had to call on all of his vast experience, skill, knowledge and power to escape with the few he did. It was a harrowing experience. The creatures had attacked with such ferocity, as much as Voldemort would have expected of his own followers should they be fearful of displeasing him.

He had lost a dozen followers as they made their way off that accursed island.

Bellatrix cackled madly as she launched a vicious red spell at the outer walls. The rocks blasted apart, leaving a gaping hole in the defenses. Lord Voldemort shook his head. What fools his opponents were, to leave themselves so open to attack. He quickly made a mental note to shore up the defenses with as many magical protections as he could devise once the school was in his possession. Leaving things to such paltry physical barriers was an exercise in idiocy as far as he was concerned.

"Remember, take no prisoners among the adults. The children will serve as suitable leverage. Potter and Severus are to be brought before me." With a flick of his wand, Voldemort launched his mark into sky, his skull with the snake slithering from its mouth.

Severus had never answered the call, not that anyone honestly expected the man to. Albus himself had publicly defended the man during his trial, identifying him as an invaluable spy. The idea that such a spy had existed within his ranks infuriated Voldemort. Severus's actions when the school housed the Philosopher's Stone only further proved his disloyal nature. His punishment would be long and painful.

His followers surged forward, charging the castle doors, shouting pointless rhetoric. Voldemort muttered to himself about having to regularly tolerate such inanity. Following along with his steady pace, Voldemort slowly neared the great oak doors, already open as if the castle was excitedly welcoming its new master.

As he approached the entrance hall, Voldemort noted something odd. He could no longer hear the mad cries of his followers. The sounds had changed. They were now cries of fear and terror. Except, they weren't coming from children. They were coming from his followers.

"Run away!" One of his followers screamed. "Every wizard for himself! The Demon is here! Run away!"

Voldemort watched as all but one of his followers fled past in full retreat. Before he shook off the shock of such a complete betrayal, all of them were well outside spell range. He would have to discipline them later. Being a handful of paces from the entrance was too great an opportunity to pass. Thankfully, Bellatrix had remained behind so he would not be alone. She would be greatly rewarded for her undying loyalty.

Taking the last few steps, Voldemort found himself in the entrance hall, framed on his left and right by the house point hourglasses. Opposite him was the great marble staircase. At its base was Bellatrix, hogtied and gagged.

Voldemort rasped out, "What is the meaning of this?"

A brunette witch, the one who always seemed to accompany Potter back in first year, was idly twirling her wand as she stood next to Bellatrix. Potter watched from the side, an amused expression on his face, arms folded across his chest. Eventually the boy turned to face his death.

"Oh, there you are," Potter casually stated. "We weren't expecting you for months yet."

The insolence. The utter lack of fear. The complete dismissal.

With a loud roar, Lord Voldemort brandished his wand towards the brat. As the tip glowed a bright green, the words began to form. "Ava-"

"Bloody Hell, now you've done it."

Caught off guard by Potter's interruption, Voldemort hesitated to finish the incantation.

"He's using lethal force! Section 6 Subsection B! I actually get to implement it!"

Voldemort turned to face the brunette girl who had just spoken. An expression of absolute glee, reminiscent of a happy Bellatrix, showed on her face. Having no idea what she was referring to, an expression of confusion took over his face. The next thing he saw was the ceiling of the entrance hall, promptly followed by the door frame of the great oak doors, followed by the night sky. The next thing he felt was great pain followed by nothing.

Slowly, the light from the castle and the stars faded. His breathing grew difficult and shallow. Looking about, Voldemort saw his wand had fallen from his grasp. He tried to move his arms. They failed to respond. He tried to move his legs. They failed to respond.

The long silence passed. Voldemort was not sure how long elapsed, whether it was seconds, minutes or even hours. Finally, he heard voices drawing near.

"Jeez, Hermione, how far did you launch him?" It was the Potter brat. "Oh, wait, there he is, right next to the gates."

The girl, Hermione apparently, responded. "You know exactly how long I've been waiting to do that. All that restraining myself to proportionate responses was getting tiresome."

Potter sighed. "I know but if that hadn't been in our agreement you wouldn't be friends with Neville, Luna, Gabrielle, even Fleur." The girl mumbled something unintelligible. "I know you don't like admitting it but you and Fleur are friends." Voldemort heard some robes rustling. "Okay, okay. I won't bring it up again." The boy sounded nervous.

Two shadows blocked out the remaining light.

"That looks pretty nasty, Hermione. I better go tell Professor Dumbledore that you took care of ol' Snakeface. Someone will have to clean this mess up and it won't be me. Just because we're Heads doesn't mean he can foist off all of his work on us."

Voldemort heard footfalls as Potter walked away. Voldemort tried to rant and rave but his body refused to cooperate. Eventually, the footfalls faded off into the distance. One shadow remained over him. He heard rustling as the figure kneeled over him.

The girl heaved a heavy sigh, filling him with a fear he had never before felt. "You just had to pick tonight. I was all comfy, curled up against him in front of a nice, warm fire. He was playing with my hair. I was playing with his other hand. Everything was wonderful." He heard her stand.

"Oh well. It doesn't look like you'll be moving anytime soon. I suppose I can go back to him." There was a brief silence. "Oo! Maybe if I play this right, I'll get some extra cuddles because of some trauma from your attack!"

With that, the shadow above him vanished. As his consciousness faded, Voldemort heard a happy humming drift away in the wind. He could picture the girl happily skipping back towards the warm glow of the castle. Finally, the blackness took him.

* * *

 _ **Yes, they actually have a provision describing how Hermione can respond to lethal force directed at Harry. It was a necessary concession on Harry's part.**_


	31. Chapter 31

_**The origins of the agreement.**_

* * *

 **August 1994**

Hermione found herself skipping down the pavement towards 4 Privet Drive. It had been three whole days without seeing Harry and she was fighting every impulse not to break out in a run. Walking was not an option as it was simply not fast enough.

Her parents had taken Hermione and Harry to a beach in Kent for his fourteenth birthday. They spent the entire day playing in the sand, the surf, window shopping and generally enjoying each other's company. She had spent hours planning out the perfect day for him only for Harry to decide to enjoy whatever caught his fancy. It had been better than she had hoped.

As she approached the house where Harry was staying – she refused to call it his home – Hermione noticed a dejected Harry weeding the front flower beds. Ignoring any pretense, Hermione ran as fast as her legs would carry her.

"Harry!"

Her Harry looked up at her. He gave her a smile that spoke of exhaustion mixed with relief and complete contentment. Before he had a chance to stand and greet her, Hermione leapt at him. She wrapped her arms around him, held him tight and let her momentum carry them both to the ground. When they were done tumbling in the topsoil and crushing several of Petunia Dursley's prized flowers, Hermione relaxed her hug just enough to pull back and look at Harry in his gorgeous green eyes.

"What's wrong?" She asked. "I haven't seen you work in the gardens since summer after first year. I thought I had corrected the Dursleys' thinking about making you do all the chores."

Harry just shook his head at her. His hair flopped about funnily given that he was lying on his back. "They're just being their usual nasty selves. Uncle Vernon is grumbling about the news. That's nothing new. Aunt Petunia is apparently getting laughed at by the other housewives because she didn't win best lawn this summer for the first time in five years. She isn't taking it too well and is blaming me. Dudley's school is forcing him on a diet because they don't make uniforms in his size. He's being the worst of the bunch."

Hermione sat back on her heels, still straddling Harry. "Your aunt is blaming you? Why?"

"Like I said, I used to take care of the lawn and flower beds when I was younger and I haven't had to since you talked to them after first year." Harry raised up, propping himself up on his elbows. "Last year, she still won 'Best Lawn' but it was a lot closer since she doesn't take care of things the way she used to insist I do. Apparently, this year she didn't even finish in the top three."

Growling erupted from Hermione's throat. She could not believe that the Dursleys had forgotten her lecture from two years before. Admittedly, it was not her best bit of lecturing but, considering she had had no time to properly prepare, it was rather impressive.

"I'll be right back." Standing, Hermione quickly brushed off the bits of soil and grass that had stuck to her sundress. Taking a brief moment to collect her thoughts, Hermione took a steadying breath and marched to the front door.

The eruption of vitriol echoed throughout the neighbourhood. No one could exactly understand what was being said, or even where it was coming from, but, for a half hour, there was not a soul on Privet Drive or any of the neighbouring streets that moved. Even several cars came to full stops and idled for the duration of the chastising lecture.

Before she departed to go spend time with her Harry again, Hermione checked herself over in the mirror by the front door. Several hairs were out of place. At that, Hermione realized she had let loose a bit more than intended. Normally she was much more controlled. Straightening the loose strands, Hermione made her way outside to where her Harry was waiting for her.

He had a rather unhappy look on his face.

"Let's go," Harry declared. Hermione silently followed his lead, firmly latched onto his arm. As they were walking towards the local park, Harry spoke. "We have got to do something about this. Yes, my relatives have been rather nasty to be around lately but I'm pretty sure half the county heard you yelling at them."

"But they were being mean to you," Hermione tried to explain.

"Nope. That isn't going to work this time, Hermione. And stop trying the pouty look." Hermione's pout disappeared. "For your information, before you went charging in there, I was going to tell you that I was working with the flowers of my own volition to get out of the house for a bit."

Hermione let her head drop, hoping to hide her embarrassed blush.

"Now, we're going to sit down, and write out a list of what you can and can't do to people that are mean or try to hurt me." Hermione looked up at Harry, appalled that he would suggest she needed limits on such things.

Huffing, Hermione interjected. "Fine, but we're also going to include things I expect you to do as my boyfriend like standing up for yourself."

Harry just nodded. "I suppose things like that are fine. Now, as I was say-"

"Oh! And we can put in things like biweekly dates and cuddle time and . . ."

Hermione wasn't sure when they arrived at the park. She wasn't sure when the sun had dipped below the horizon. What she did know was she had somehow acquired 30 pages of notes for elements to include in their agreement. She suspected it would take them the rest of the break to finalize it.

Thankfully, Harry had caved on her insistence that there must be special provisions for her handling of those skanky bitches that kept trying to steal her Harry. If only he hadn't put in a stipulation of his own that she couldn't just hide the bodies after she was done teaching them their lessons. How could she properly convey her opinions on their actions with such stifling limitations?

* * *

 _ **Thirty-one consecutive days of connected stories. Personal challenge met. The actual agreement will be posted in a future chapter. I need a break.**_


End file.
